What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story
by Lucy Labrador
Summary: What happened during Shadow's long absense during 'What A Long Hard Life? This story explains it all, resolving the unanswered question's about Bless, Shadow's daughter and his other family members.
1. Chapter 1

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 1: He's Gone**

**It's finally here. This was supposed to be done months ago, so here's my explanation as to why it's so late. When I finished What A Long Hard Life, I went on holiday with my netbook, when I came back, my netbook had broken. By the time I had it fixed, I could no longer be bothered. Then I started A-Levels. **

**It's now half term, so I have time to write this story. Hopefully, it will be done by the end of the short holiday so it's not left unfinished. **

**Disclaimer: ****I do not own any Sonic characters. Some of the characters in this are mine, including Bless, Shadow's Daughter. **

**You should REALLY read 'What A Long Hard Life' before you read this. It takes place during Shadow's absence, so there won't be a huge repeat of the previous one. **

Bless watched in horror as her father left her, her mother and older brother alone on the beach. She wanted to call out to him, but he was already gone. The wind blew harshly against them, Shade and Maria were in their pyjamas, and the flames were homing in on the surrounding area, the only way to survive this, was go into the water.

As they did, Bless began to think of the last words he had said to her. No, it wasn't the 'I'm sorry.' that seemed to be directed mostly at Maria, the words of anger. "Bless, how could you do this-" until he was cut off by the large explosion outside. It was official, she hated him.

He didn't bother to even say goodbye properly, would he even return? "Mum… what's going on?" Bless turned up to Maria and asked.

"I don't know… but whatever it is… I believe that your Dad is trying to stop it. And I hope he comes back safely." Maria said worriedly, pulling her two children in to hug, as they were being surrounded by more Mobians that had come to get away from the flames. Bless began to think if it was just one of those lies to protect her, what if she did know the truth, the reason for this disaster. As a matter of fact, Maria had no clue, Shadow had never told her about the flames of disaster.

They stood in the ocean, up to their shins in freezing cold water, that was orange from the light of the flames that were burning the city in the distance. "Mum… I'm tired…" Shade complained after the first hour of waiting. "And cold… you'd think all of this fire would make us warm…" he shivered. "I wish we had time to bring supplies."

So did the others. Bless was shivering, standing in the water wasn't doing them any good, but even the dry sand at the top of the beach had caught fire. It was a massacre.

Amongst all of these strangers surrounding them, they saw a few familiar faces, which were coming towards them. Sonic, Amy and their kids Rush and Swift Rouge Knuckles and their kids Russet and Rose. Tails and Cream also. It was very convenient that they all had emergency supplies with them, plenty of food and blankets… Bless was thankful that they gave one to her.

Now a big group, they moved onto the damp sand instead of in the freezing water and set up a small space. "Oh guys… you're the best…" Maria said, extremely grateful that they had all brought extra supplies to share.

"Where's Shadow?" Rouge asked, looking worried.

"He ran off to help with the flames." Maria explained, looking sad.

"No… he shouldn't have done that…" Rouge said, going pale, she turned to Knuckles who also looked a but worried. "It's all over for him now…" she mumbled to herself.

"What?" Maria asked, she had no idea of what Rouge just said.

"I said… I hope he doesn't get hurt…" she lied, smiling politely at Maria. Rouge knew that Shadow would be hunted, and she had promised to remain by his side too, what if it was too late, she felt that she had to do something about this. "I have to go and check up with GUN… Knuckles… look after the twins!" she yelled and flew off.

"What's going on?" Maria asked looking nervous, it seemed as if Rouge knew something about Shadow. The others turned away, not saying anything, Maria was hating this, they all knew something about Shadow, but didn't want to tell her.

Bless sat there, staring into space, she had completely zoned out, she was lost in her thoughts, something that her dad would do a lot. _Why did he leave me… after all he's put me through, he owes me so much, so why did he leave me! _She came back to reality, noticing the events, Rouge leaving and everyone being quiet.She got up from the sandy floor, "Where the hell is he!" she said angrily at them all, standing taller than all of them since they were all sat down.

"Bless please…" Maria said, gently tugging on Bless' arm so that she would sit down.

"No! I need to know where he is so I can teach him a lesson… for leaving us! It's been hours now!" Bless yelled furiously. "He doesn't care about us at all!" she screamed.

"Dad does care about us! He went off to help those in trouble! He's being a hero!" Shade said to her angrily, getting offended that Bless has said such a thing about his hero, Shade looked up to his dad all of the time.

"If Shadow went out to save people… then why didn't you Sonic?" Tails asked, looking puzzled.

"I wanted to stay with my family for once… we've all moved on from that now… besides… this is how it's supposed to be…" Sonic said, looking fed up.

"What do you mean… 'how it's supposed to be'?" Maria said, looking serious. "You're all hiding something from us, aren't you? You all know something… but don't want to tell me… well… I deserve so know!" she started to shout. "Shadow's my husband!"

"When Rouge comes back." Knuckles said, "She knows a lot about this too…" he said looking solemn.

Maria began to cry, she feared the worse, they knew something and she had a strong feeling Shadow was hurt. Amy scooted over to her to comfort her, the whole group looked guilty. They hoped that in some way, Rouge could postpone Shadow's defeat.

After a long night the kids had fallen asleep despite the noise from the crowd, and the adults were keeping a watch over them. Knuckles was keeping an eye out for Rouge, she hadn't even returned yet.

By now the sun would normally be rising, but, there was no sign of it. They were now living in eternal darkness.

After a lengthy and anxious wait, Rouge returned looking disappointed, they all looked to her. She landed by them and shook her head in sadness. "Ok… what's going on!" Maria asked desperately. Rouge, pulled Maria away from the others to speak to her in private.

"Maria… you're not going to see Shadow again… he's been captured… by the commander…" Rouge said solemnly, getting tears in her eyes.

"Well… go and free him… you work for GUN…" Maria said hopefully. "Wait… can't he escape himself… he's done that plenty of times…" she was silenced by the others.

"No… Maria… he's been put into the machine… his… _eternal _prison… there's no escape from it… he's gone…" she said, and pulled Maria in for a hugged. They both sobbed their eyes out.

"Did you see him?" Maria said through her heavy tears.

"No… I just found out… the commander's gone missing too… must have been lost while he locked Shadow up…" Rouge said. "Serves him right…" she growled. "I never liked him… I swear he's been after Shadow from the start."

After a long cry, they returned to the group. Bless had no idea what was going on, Maria had hid the fact that she had been crying by the time she came back. All seemed ok to Bless.

They every one of the gang stayed there for a few days, where it was safe until large amounts of the fire was extinguished, and they could move to higher ground where it was safe and dry.

Bless was still angry at Shadow for not coming back. While Shade was upset and refusing to talk, Bless however was not afraid to speak her mind. "He is such a prick! Why did he leave! He doesn't care about us at all… we could have died because he left us!" Bless screamed.

"Bless… I am warning you now… stop talking about your father like that!" Maria said, starting to lose her temper.

"No! Why won't he just come back and show himself, face up to us so I can give him a piece of my mind!" Bless continued to rave. "He's no ultimate life form if can't even do that! Why the hell did you call him that!"

"This is your last chance… stop talking about your dad in that way… or I will punish you!" Maria began to shout.

"No! I hate him! He's done me nothing but bad! It's all his fault that I'm bullied in school, that I'm like this! And what does he do? He leaves us! He's a bastard, and he doesn't care about us one bit!" Bless screamed.

That's when Maria broke down and cried, Shadow was the person she loved the most, and her own daughter was saying such filth about him. She missed Shadow so much, he was gone forever, but wasn't allowed to let her kids know.

Bless didn't know what to do, she was feeling no remorse, she still felt angry. "This is just ridiculous… I'm going to find him!" Bless growled and ran off, into the city where she was more likely to get burnt by the flames.

"Bless! No!" Shade yelled, he went to run after him but Sonic stepped up and stopped him.

"No… let me go and get her… I wouldn't want the both of you to get hurt." Sonic said, standing up as a responsible adult. He ran off down the hill to find her.

Bless was now surrounded by flames, it was so hot and she had trouble breathing through the thick smoke. She ran between the burning building and cars, one of them exploded near her, sending her crashing to the floor. She screamed out as she did, but recovered immediately and continued to look for Shadow.

After a long search in the scorching hot city, she began to feel dizzy, her body couldn't take the heat and harmful gasses any more. She stopped and bent over to catch her breath, which was hard to do through the smoke.

Then she heard a crumble from the building standing high above her. She screamed as it all started to fall, a large chunk of scalding hot concrete falling right towards her. In that split second she saw someone in the corner of her eyes. Another hedgehog, with long spikes, he seemed to be coming at her fast. _My dad's fast, and he has spikes like that… could it really be him? _She felt strong arms grab her, picking her up bridal style, she was swept away from the falling spot for the building and back to safety.

She clung onto this man's torso tightly, to notice, no white fluffy chest, instead nothing, she looked up to see green eyes piercing through the misty air. It was not her dad, it was Sonic. She began to cry, her dad never came to save her. _Even Sonic cares more about me than HE does. _She thought.

She was given back to Maria, Sonic put her down gently onto the blankets on the floor, she felt so weak, and she coughed to get the bad chemicals out of her lungs. Maria hugged her tightly. "Don't you dare run away again…" Maria sobbed, embracing her lovingly.

"I won't… because he's not out there… he doesn't care…" Bless cried, and continued to do so until she physically couldn't cry any more, that's when she fell asleep. He body would need some rest to be able to recover from the damage the heat and smoke did to her body.

While her body healed, she dreamt, about Shadow. He was there, like when she was younger, and he played with her, as if he did love her. He wasn't always that playful though. As she got older, he became a little more grouchy, or maybe she had just started to notice his grouchiness. The way he would always look solemn, especially if Maria wasn't there.

So, he was there, in the dream looking solemn, just watching her crying and screaming in the flames, she called out to him. But he just narrowed his eyes at her, turned around left. "I don't have time for kids anymore…" he grumbled in his usual fed up voice, and he was gone. Bless screamed out for him to help her, but he never came, he let her burn.

The others were anxiously waiting for her to wake up, when she did, she sat up, breathing heavily, looking around in shock. She slowly calmed down, realising it was just a dream. The dream seemed so real, like something he would do, she thought about it carefully, hatred for her father increasing tenfold.

**I think that went very well. To help you visualise this better, in case you've forgotten or didn't know this. Bless is 10, Shade is 14, Maria is in her late 20s, and so is Sonic and the others. Tails and Cream are in their early 20s though.**

**Hope that helped. If you're still confused, READ What A Long Hard Life! Or ask me. **

**Lucy Labrador **


	2. Chapter 2

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless****'**** Story**

**Chapter 2: It****'****s Not My Fault**

Time went on, Bless grew and so did the other Kids. Bless would always look to the other's for protection, she wasn't that skilled at all when it came to fighting. However, Shade was good at fighting and self defence. It always came in handy, as supplies were always scarce and some people didn't like to share.

It was nearly time for Bless' 11th birthday. And there was only one thing she wanted for her birthday. "Dad has to come back tomorrow… how can he forget it? I know he'll come." Bless said with confidence.

"He didn't come for my 15th." Shade said, sulking. "So why would he come for _yours_." he sneered.

"Please you two… are you sure there isn't anything else you want?" Maria asked, knowing Shadow couldn't come. Bless shook her head. "Any toys?" Bless continued to refuse. "A nice cake?"

"How can we get any of this stuff anyway? Everything's destroyed." Bless said with doubt. "Were living in this tiny safe house… there's no room for anything… don't bother." she growled and went into the bedroom that the three of them shared.

'This tiny safe house' consisted of three rooms, a living room/kitchen, a bedroom and a small bathroom. And that's what the three of them shared. It was an apartment and their neighbours were Sonic and his Family, Rouge and her family and Tails and Cream.

Their living conditions were said to get better once the government, or what was left of it, could make a project to build better safe houses. These old ones were damp, dusty and falling apart. They were hardly allowed out of the building either, for their own safety. Only those who qualified were allowed out, those who could survive out there.

Every apartment block, had a few government run facilities at the bottom, they were adapted from what used to be receptions of hotels and other things. So, the kids could go to school and families could buy food. Bless, hated school. Every day she was stared at by the others because of how she looked, just like her dad.

Rumours started to spread saying Shadow The Hedgehog had caused Iblis to be released, this was bad news for Bless. She was constantly bullied and reminded of this, some blamed her, some felt sorry for her for having him as a father. She felt sorry for herself too. Shade looked nothing like Shadow, so he got away from all of this, only a few knew who he really was, and they were Sonic and Amy's kids and Rouge and Knuckles' Kids.

Bless birthday came around, and all she did all day was stare at the front door and wait for Shadow to turn up. _Any minute now__…__ he__'__s going to come and say sorry for doing this to me__…_She thought confidently at the beginning of the day but as the day dragged on she lost enthusiasm. _Come on, this is all I ask for__…__ nothing, no presents or a cake__…__ just for you to come through that door now__…__ please. _It started to get late, no change in light outside, it was always dark. _Hurry up, you__'__re bad enough for leaving it this long, and you__'__re late__…__ I hate you dad__…__ I hate you. _

Bed time came, Maria and Shade were upset that Bless hadn't wanted to move from her spot all day, but they didn't want to force her to move. "Come on Bless it's bed time… off to the bedroom… please." Maria said in a soft voice.

"No… he's going to come… any second… nnnnnnooooowww….now! Now! NOW!" still nothing. She burst into tears. "He doesn't care at all… about any of us." she screamed.

"He does, stop saying that… I promise. He does care…" Maria said, she wanted to cry too, but she didn't want to look weak in front of her children, or it might make matters worse.

Bless was put into bed, with much retaliation, and as usual she cried herself to sleep. She fell deep into her dreams again.

She saw him another time, Shadow. Him and her was in absolute emptiness, facing each other. "Why didn't you come dad?" Bless asked him.

"Like I said before… I don't have time for you kids…" he said, looking at her with hatred.

"But it was my birthday." she sobbed.

"Huh… I never knew…" he said, not sounding bothered.

"You're bastard! A hate you!" Bless screamed at her father, the corrupted one that she saw in him. The Shadow of her mind of wasn't disturbed by this one bit, he just rolled his eyes, his frown then turned to a malicious smile, his hideously long fangs showing.

"You're pathetic… I can't believe _YOU _are my daughter." he snarled. Bless screamed out crying, covering her face to hide her tears. "I'm glad I left… such a shame I had to give up my wife and son to get away from you…" he said, his voice fading away as Bless began to wake up.

She was being shaken by Maria. "Bless, wake up!" she as shaking her. When Bless opened her eyes, she could see that she looked worried.

"What's… going on?" Bless said, looking afraid.

"You were screaming in your sleep… did you have a bad dream?" Maria asked, sitting down on the bed with her.

"No…" Bless said in a shaky voice, refusing to say anything.

"Well, if you want to talk… I'm right here…" Maria said, walking over to her bed, she got back under the covers and tried to get to sleep.

Bless couldn't get back to sleep at all, she was too afraid. She just wanted Shadow to come back… and be a normal dad, so they could get on with life as normal. Then as always, she silently cried herself to sleep.

The next day was just any normal day, they all got up and Maria sent the kids downstairs to school. Bless, like any other day, didn't feel like going to school, but there was no choice.

She went through the entrance, and got stares from everyone, she felt very insecure. Shade had split from her already, they had agreed not to be seen with each other, it was easier that way.

Also, Shade's name on the register, was Robotnik, the name meant nothing these days, Eggman had not been seen or heard from in over a decade. So, since his last name was Robotnik to the other children and not Doom, like Bless', no body ever guessed they were siblings.

She came into the class room, it would be another long day. Then she heard one of the kids from behind her whisper- "Hey you… freak… how does it feel to be the daughter of the guy who got us into this mess…" they hissed in a nasty voice.

Bless turned around to see who it was, everyone around her looked innocent, as if nothing happened. She shrugged and faced the front again. "Don't shrug you freak… it's not as simple as that."

"Okay… who the hell is that?" Bless screamed at the row behind her.

"Bless!" the human female teacher at the front screamed. "Did I just hear that word again?" she said sternly. Bless looked at her nervously.

"Maybe…" Bless said in a timid voice. The teacher began to tut. "But-"

"No buts… I've told you many times not to say it. This is going on your record." she said, sounding disappointed in her.

"Screw the record!" Bless said, then covered her mouth in shock, as if her mouth had said it against her orders.

"How dare you!" The teacher said and a furious voice. Bless shook her head frantically, her hands still on her mouth, her eyes wide and beginning to fill with tears. "You're going to the head… NOW!" the teacher shouted and pointed to the door.

"But I… didn't meant to say it… it's not my fault!" Bless said.

"Who's fault is it then?" the teacher said, sounding unconvinced. Bless knew exactly who's fault it was, Shadow's. She had inherited his foul mouth and bad attitude from him, it was on her nature to be like that… but not in her heart. She didn't want to say this though, she knew the teacher wouldn't accept this as an excuse.

"I… I… don't… know…" she said slowly and timidly. The teacher pointed to the door again. Bless got up and ran out of the door crying. She decided she would go home, she didn't want to go to the Head Teacher, (Principle, to those in America.) he was horrible. Adults were tough ever since this disaster happened, especially the humans, they hated Mobians.

She ran to the exits of the school, two large double doors, but they were being guarded. "Where do you think you're going… get back to class." said the men at the door. Bless ran back down the corridor again, she wouldn't be allowed out until home time. It was no use, she would have to go to the Head Teacher's office.

Unless she hid. She ran to the girls toilets, they would be a perfect place to hide, but they were locked during lessons. She could get the key from reception… but they would get suspicious. "Damn it…" she to herself under her breath. She slowly made her way to the Head's office.

She knocked on the door slowly, then waited anxiously for a reply. "Come in." she heard the head's deep voice. She began to shake, while she opened the door and peeped inside. "Ah… Bless, finally, I got an Email from your teacher ten minute ago, I was expecting you a little sooner." he said solemnly. Bless swallowed hard, stepping into to the room fully. "Close the door." he ordered calmly.

Bless turned around and closed the door, she began to shake. "Take a seat." the Head Teacher said, a hint of mischief in his voice. Bless took a chair from the side of the small room and put it in front of the desk the Head was at, she sat down. "Now Bless-"

"Please don't hurt me!" Bless whined out in a high pitched voice.

"QUIET!" he yelled, slamming his hand down on the desk. Bless stopped squealing, instead, she was shaking uncontrollably in her seat. "Now… what have we told you about your attitude… girl." he hissed. Bless stayed quiet, shutting her eyes tight, hoping it would all be other soon. "Speak!"

"I'M SORRY!" She squealed out. "I couldn't help it… it just came out… please… don't hurt me…" she said and started to cry.

"I'm afraid, I'm going to have to punish you… ever since this disaster… the rules have become tighter… and the punishments even harsher! Especially to you Mobians…" he snarled, he got up and took Bless by her wrist.

He took her down the corridors, to a part in the school Bless had never seen before. He opened a small door and shoved her inside the room, he slammed the door and locked her inside. Bless was now in a small closet like room, it was pitch black, and cold. "Let me out!" she screamed.

"No… you'll be staying in there all day. I'll come and get you at four o'clock." he said and left.

"But that's like six hours away! Please!" she cried out, but it was no use, he was gone.

Bless sat on the floor and pulled her knees up to her torso, still shaking. It was completely dark, and Bless hated the dark. Any kid would, she would have to last about 6 hours in this prison, until she was freed.

Once that six hours had passed, the head master came back and opened the door, Bless came running out but he caught her. "Where do you think you're going?" he said, "You're coming to office for after school detention."

"But I need the toilet." she complained. "And I'm really hungry."

"Good, this'll be a good two hours then, won't it." he sneered and shoved her back down the corridor, the two of them passed Shade, who was on his way out of school. He stopped and looked at the Head master.

"Bless?" he said in shock. "What are you doing to her!" he shouted furiously, blocking their path.

"How does it concern you? Now go home you little rodent!" the Head teacher said, pushing past him and shoving Bless into his office. She gave a squeal as he did so.

"Let her go! What did she do to deserve this!" Shade demanded to know in a bold voice.

"Now Shade, you're a good student, don't get involved in this." the Head warned him.

"Shade, please help me, he locked me in a closet all day." Bless sobbed from inside the office.

"How dare you do that… to my sister!" he raged, he threw his school bag to the floor and jumped on the head master's head, smashing him into the wall. He then jumped down, got hold of Bless' arm, grabbed his stuff and took her out of the school, not looking back.

**There are links to pictures for this chapter on my Profile. I could have posted them here, but Fan fiction doesn't let you. So, check out my profile for those links. I'm not sure if I'll do pictures for every chapter though. **

**Lucy Labrado**


	3. Chapter 3

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 3: The Unwanted Visitor **

**Hey guys. Thanks for these reviews, they're great. There's was just one problem… the **_**mystery reviewer!**_ **I was going to ask them to come forward for their review in this chapter, but they already reviewed again. So, thanks Cora Roz, I am no longer so confused. **

The two of them returned home, Bless crying her eyes out, and Shade was feeling rather ashamed of himself. "I am going to be in so much trouble…" he groaned, taking Bless upstairs to their apartment.

"No you're not… you did it to protect me… I was in there for over six hours… and he was going to keep me behind another two hours. Thank you so much." she said and hugged him tightly.

"Hey… there's no need to say thanks… you're my sister… I needed to do something about it… but I _am _going to be in a lot of trouble…" he said and sighed.

"Mum will understand." Bless assured him.

"But the authorities won't. We're Shadow's kids Bless… this'll defiantly be looked into… and now he knows we're siblings… I'm done for…" he said, hanging his head in shame.

They started their next flight of stairs. "Wait a minute… where's your stuff?" Shade asked Bless.

"I left them in classroom this morning, before I got sent to see the Head." she sulked. "I don't wanna go back for them now… we have to get home soon, I really have to go." she said, wiggling on the spot.

"I don't blame you… let's go…. just three flights to go." Shade said and helped her up.

They got to the door, Shade knocked on it nervously. Maria was inside, she opened the door, wondering why the two of them were a little later than usual. She unlocked the door to find Bless bawling her eyes out and Shade looking guilty. "What's going on? Are you being bullied again Bless?"

"No worse… the Head Teacher… he… locked her in a closet all day… without food or water…" Shade explained seriously, this made Maria gasp, she also went pale. "And he was going to keep her after school for two hours… he was handling her pretty roughly."

"Oh… no…" Maria cried out, she pulled Bless close to her and hugged her tight. "So you took her home?"

"Yes… but I… had to… attack… the head… to…." Shade went silent, Maria went even paler. "I'm sorry… I was just so angry… Bless was so scared… and he called me a rodent…"

"Ok… let's get you two inside and sort this out…" Maria said, trying to calm down. Bless pulled away from Maria and ran into the toilet, slamming the door as she did so. "Oh… dear." Maria said breathlessly, she didn't know what to do. "Neither of you are going to school tomorrow… I think I'll speak to the head-"

"He's human." Shade said simply.

"I'll think we'll discuss this with the others." Maria changed her mind. "Wait… why did they do this to Bless… what did she do?"

That's when Bless came out looking more at ease. Maria looked at her worriedly. "What… there's nothing wrong… I just really needed to-"

"What did you do… to get that punishment." Maria asked with concern.

"I said a bad word… then I said 'screw the record.' then I was sent to the Head's office…" Bless explained, Maria had raised her eyebrows at this. "But I didn't mean to say 'screw the record'… it just came out… I'm really sorry."

"No need to be sorry… it's the school that needs to be sorry." Maria said. "I'm going to Sonic… he should know what to do-"

There was a thunderous knock on the door. Maria went to answer it, feeling nervous, it certainly wasn't a friendly knock. She opened the door by a jar, the kids ran into the bedroom. "Hello?" Maria said timidly, the door was pushed open fully by their unexpected visitor. She was pushed back but not hard enough to lose her balance.

It was a GUN soldier. Maria gasped, "W-what… do you want? Is there a problem?" she said to him, trying to look unaffected by the push.

"This is the home of Shade _Doom_… right?" the soldier said, peering into the apartment.

"Yes… but… he's not home yet…" She lied. "Why?"

"Today he assaulted a member of staff at the school." the soldier told her.

"Oh… was it serious? Is that why he isn't home yet?" she said, acting shocked.

"It wasn't serious… it was enough to give the member of staff a minor bruise, but it was assault from Mobian to human, which is a serious offence… when will he be home?"

"What…. So you can arrest him? Shade is a good boy… he was obviously aggravated to have to do something like that. Did you even think about the _other _side of the story?"

"_Where _is your son." the soldier said in a threatening voice, pushing inside the apartment. Maria gave out a scream, she certainly didn't want this soldier pushing into her home, she hoped to get the attention of Sonic, or Knuckles, one of the boys. They could take care of this. But instead, she caught the attention of someone else.

Shade came running out of the bedroom, charging at the soldier. Maria saw The Soldier reach for his gun. "NO!" she screamed. She turned to Shade to try and stop him, but the trigger was pulled, a dart was released and it hit Shade in the torso.

"Oww!" he yelped, but it was too late, the liquid seeped itself into him, and he started to feel dizzy. Maria ran to catch him as he fell back and lost consciousness. It wasn't what she feared, she thought there would be bullets in that gun.

"Why would you do this… he's a child…" Maria started to cry. Bless now also came running out of the bedroom.

"You! You're Bless Doom! Stay where you are… you're all under arrest… why didn't I realise this before! You're all wanted by GUN!" the soldier said and backed them up against the wall, picking Shade up off the floor but his arm.

"Why? For being relatives of Shadow?" Maria said angrily. "We will not go down without a fight!" The dart gun was pointed at her, she still stood confidently. He then pointed it at Bless, "No…. please don't hurt her-"

"OWW!" the soldier cried, and dropped Shade. Shade had woken up already, he had bitten the soldier on the arm, so he was now free. He ran to Maria and Bless.

"Let's get out of here!" he yelled.

"Don't you dare move…" he said, pointing a different gun at them. "Or I will use bullets… now come quietly, or else-"

"What on Mobius is going on here?" came Rouges voice from the door. The soldier turned around to see her dressing gown looking irritated.

"Major Rouge **(Don't really know if that's the best rank for Rouge…) **I've found them… the… oh _chaos_…" he said, backing down, Rouge was literally on fire.

"Those are MY friends, how dare you do this to them! Mobian or not… now get out of here or I will demote you! GO!" she said, pointing to the exit. The soldier ran and left. She ran to the three of them, they were all shaking in fear. "It's okay now… he's gone… did he hurt any of you?"

"Shade got hit with a dart… are you ok Shade?" Maria said, turning to him.

"Feel a bit dizzy still… but I'm ok." he said, wobbling a bit. Maria took him into the bedroom so he could lie down, Bless and Rouge followed. The front door was still opened, they heard Sonic's voice.

"Guys! Are you alright… I heard a scream!" Sonic then came running into the bedroom. Rouge was standing there staring at him with an annoyed expression on her face while Maria was putting Shade to bed. "What?"

"Yes… there was a problem, but I already sorted it out… I thought you were meant to be fast." Rouge complained. She strolled to the door. "Call for me if you need anything else!" she yelled to Maria, and left.

"So… uh… what happened here?" Sonic asked nervously, rubbing the back of his neck.

"A GUN soldier tired to take us away… we're now wanted because we're related to Shadow." Maria said. Sonic didn't look surprised.

"Sounds like something they'd do… well… if you ever need to hide… come to us… we're always there for you." Sonic said and he left to, closing the front door gently behind him.

"Mum… are we going to be taken away?" Bless asked sounding afraid.

"No Bless… we will not… I'll do everything to make sure that we don't. Now… I'll make dinner." she said and walked off into the kitchen.

"Shade… are you okay…" Bless asked in a quite timid voice.

"Yes… I just still feel a bit tired… probably because I woke up too quick… I should be fine by tea time." Shade reassured her. Bless kneeled down by the bed and snuggled her head into his chest.

"I'm sorry Shade… this is all my fault…" she began to cry again.

"But it's not your fault… you answered back to the teacher… so what… I did that when I was younger… it was the Head's fault. I hate him… I hated him from the start… it was like he had his eye on you all along." he said, deep in thought.

"Yeah… I've never seen him be so bad to anyone else… I hate Mr Towers too…" Bless said. "He should be fired from his job for hurting me…"

"You know what Bless… I think so too… but the world is so corrupt these days… I don't think that it will happen… I think we're going to be on the run… like in those stories dad told us…"

Bless pulled away immediately. "What's wrong?" Shade said, looking at her.

"Why did you have to mention him!" Bless yelled angrily. "Don't ever mention that prick again!" Bless screamed.

"Are you _still _angry at him!" Shade yelled sitting up. "Why are you angry at him… it's probably not his fault he can't come… I bet he's thinking about us all of the time!" Shade growled.

They heard a pan drop and Maria came zooming in. "What's going on now?" she said sounding panicked.

"She still hates dad! I only mention him once and she snapped!" Shade complained.

"Bless… please keep your anger under control… I know you don't like your Dad at the moment because he's not here for you… but he does care." Maria said softly. "I promise you… he does…" there was a long pause. Now Bless was looking ashamed for herself. "You two should wash your hands, Dinner's nearly ready." she sighed and left to go and serve the food.

The two of them got up in silence and went to the bathroom to wash their hands. It would be a very quiet meal that evening.

When it was nearly ten o'clock at night, very late for the two of them. But after the shocking events of that day, Maria let them stay up as none of them could ease themselves enough to go to sleep.

They sat and watched TV, it was an extremely small TV but it was better than nothing. They all cuddled up on the sofa while doing so, under a blanket where they were all really warm. They started to remember the times they would do that before, but with Shadow too. They all really missed Shadow, even Bless, despite hating the most, she missed him the most.

When it was reaching one in the morning, they all started to drop off to sleep on the sofa together. Bless delving deep into one of her dreams again.

"I bet my chest fur… that you get caught by them… you'll never be able to run away from them like I did… you're too pathetic." came Shadow's cruel voice.

"We will not… mum said so…" Bless said with determination.

"But you're asleep… they could creep inside any minute… you always have to be on guard." Shadow teased.

"Well… how do I wake up?" Bless panicked.

"You work it out… I can't teach you _everything_! Do something yourself you lazy girl!"

"I got treated so badly today… and you don't care… do you?" Bless started to cry again, would she go at least one dream where she wouldn't cry? The father her imagination had created was cruel!

"Not really no… and I'm not surprised… what was the name of the Head again… Tower? Sounds familiar… doesn't it?"

"No… wait, of course… where _did _I hear that name before…." Bless thought to herself, but Shadow was starting to fade away. "Wait… don't go… who is it!"

"Work it out yourself you lazy little…"

She awoke. Realising where she had heard that name before she met that teacher, "Cruelty must run in the family…" she hissed to herself, looked at Maria and Shade, noticed they both still asleep, and did the same. She shifted a little and went back to sleep.

**Does any one realise where the name comes from?**

**Lucy Labrador**


	4. Chapter 4

**What A Long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 4: Rescue **

The three of them were woken up by another knock at the door. Maria opened her eyes groggily and looked at the clock, it was ten o'clock in the morning, they had definitely overslept. He walked to the door, another few hard knocks came while she did so.

She put the chain on the door, so the door couldn't be opened fully this time, then unlocked it, taking a peek at who was there. It was only Rouge. "Oh… Rouge…" Maria smiled and sighed with relief. "Just a second…" she said, she closed the door, undid the chain and opened it fully.

Rouge pushed inside looking panicked, she had her GUN uniform on. "You have to run… NOW!" she said, taking Maria by the shoulders. "They've ordered me to capture you… I'll tell them I tried my best, now pack up and leave!"

"WHAT!" Maria said, she felt like fainting. Rouge ran into the bedroom and started to pack some of their stuff away for them.

"Come on, there's no time!" Rouge screamed.

"Rouge! Slow down! What's this all about… is this because of yesterday!" Maria asked, running into the bedroom after her. Rouge nodded, tears in her eyes.

"I'm so sorry… I tried to tell them that you were all nice people and that you wouldn't harm anyone unless you needed to… but they wouldn't listen… now come on…" she said, trying to keep back her tears.

"What's going on?" Bless said, her and Shade coming in and wiping their eyes from the tiredness.

"You're… umm… all going on holiday…" Rouge lied.

"Rouge… we know the deal… GUN want us…" Shade said sighing. "Don't they?" Rouge nodded, biting her lip.

"Now, we don't have much time before I'm checked up on… if they know I'm helping you… they'll send someone else along…" she said, they all began packing the essentials, got changed and went to the door. "Ready?"

"Will we be able to return?" Maria asked. Rouge nodded, frowning.

"Keep in touch… you know my mobile number… I packed the mobile charger… you have your mobile, don't you?" she asked Maria. Maria nodded, checking her pockets for it, she found it and showed to Rouge. Rouge gave them all a hug. "Now go… quick…" she said sadly.

The three of them left. Rouge leaned against the wall and sighed. She got out her communications. "This is Rouge… come in… they've escaped… I couldn't catch them…" she said sadly.

"Well… we're sure you tried your best… where did they head?" the man on the other side said. Rouge looked out of the window, where she could see where they were headed, they were headed east.

"They headed west sir…" she said, sounding ashamed.

"I know… this must be hard on you… get back to base ASAP." they said, and nothing else was said.

The three of them got past the security of the building, it was time to leave, to go out into the city where they could get burnt. They went outside, the air was certainty fresher than it was inside, but not as good as it was before this disaster.

They looked up to see Rouge flying over them, "Guys… I told them you went west… you must stay east!" she called down. "Good luck!" and then flew west herself.

"Come on… east… it's this way… I think…" Maria said, and they carried on going the direction they were going in before, east.

After an hour of walked with their suitcases, which weren't that heavy since they only had the things they needed inside, they were tired. They put the suitcases on the floor and sat down on them. "Mum… did you bring money?" Shade asked.

"Yes… but it's not like we can spend it… we'll be seen…" Maria said,

"Just checking…" Shade sighed.

"And this is why I hate him…" Bless growled. The other two looked at her. "Look at what he's done now… gone and done something bad, so now _were _the ones being hunted… ridiculous… I HATE HIM!" she raged.

"Stop saying that! This isn't his fault!" Shade shouted back at her.

"But it _is _his fault… he was a criminal… so they think we're criminals! It's all his fault that we're going to be put into prison…" Bless said, frowning. "We can never go home now… why did this have to happen to us! This should only happen to people who murder and steal! Not to us!"

"Calm down… we'll get through this… we just have to stay out of site, and away from the flames too…" Shade said, looking at a nearby burning building. "I _will _make sure that you two are safe!"

"Shade… you sound just like your dad… saying things like that." Maria said. "He always wanted to protect us… even you Bless. It was all he seemed to care about, protecting us."

"But what about that time Black Doom came… he let him hurt me." Bless complained. "I still remember it clearly."

"I do too Bless… and he didn't just let it happen… he tried his best to help us. Now please stop saying things like that about him." Maria said, sounding sad and fed up. "Let's get a move on." she said and got up. Shade and Bless groaned, they didn't want to get up, they were too tired.

Another hour of walking had been and gone, they decided to take another break. "Mum… how long will this take?" Bless asked.

"We have to keep moving east… maybe once we've left station square. We need to go somewhere GUN would least expect." Maria sighed.

"How long will this take?" Bless said looking urgent.

"This could take days at this rate." Maria said, looking into the distance. Bless started to look anxious. "Why… what's wrong?"

"Nothing." Bless shook, shutting her eyes tight, looking tense as she tired to hide her discomfort.

"Bless… something's wrong… what is it? You can tell me." Maria said. Bless shook her head, he legs were together tightly and her hands grasping her knees tensely. "Bless, please…"

"She has to go." Shade smirked.

"No I don't!" she whined, holding her legs together.

"You do… why else would you be sat like that?" Shade said smartly.

"Shade… shut up… I don't…" she squealed.

"You two… stop it!" Maria snapped. The two of them were silent. "Bless… do you need to go?" Bless nodded slightly. "I doubt that there are any toilets near here… we could keep an eye out for one though."

"Okay…"Bless sulked. "But what if we don't find one!" she panicked.

"Then… we'll just have to find somewhere private for you to go." Maria said, dreading Bless' reaction.

Bless's eyes widened, then narrowed. "There is no way I'm doing that in public." she said,

"But we might not find a toilet… what will you do then?" Maria said sounding concerned.

"I don't know… wait until we do find one?" Bless said,

"There's no one around… it's okay… let's go, we've been resting for a while now." Maria said, she got up, urging the other two to get up as well. "Come on, let's get going… before someone sees us." they picked their suit cases up and walked on.

They came to a part of the city where the buildings around hadn't crumbled yet, so they were more likely to fall. so far it had just been rubble, hardly any tall standing buildings. "We can't go through here… the buildings might fall." Maria said.

"But… we have to if we want to keep going east… they've stayed standing all this time… so why would they fall now?" Shade said.

"But… we can't risk it… I don't want you two to get hurt…" Maria said.

"If we're quick, then there's less chance of them falling… those two rows look the sturdiest, let's go between them." Shade said, he walked on, Maria reluctantly followed, taking Bless' hand so she wouldn't get left behind.

They were now walking between a long row of very tall thick buildings, they were like office blocks, and were incredibly tall. They hear a creek as the buildings around them burnt. "Mum… I really need it now…" Bless complained.

"Well… we can't stop now… as soon as we've gotten through." Maria said, keeping a hold of both Shade and Bless. They kept up the pace. Then they heard a crumble, and a small piece of concrete fell from high above, landing in front of them and smashing into tiny pieces.

They began to quicken the pace, this wasn't looking good. As they walked a long, Bless accidentally kicked small piece of rubble, it went skidding across the floor, over the cracks in the unused road and into the building in front of them. It made a large creek, "What just happened?" Bless said, they hurried even more, running now, the footsteps echoing through the narrow path, the sound waves bouncing off the fragile buildings.

They heard a deafening crash behind them in the distance, then more crashes getting louder and louder. The buildings were all collapsing behind them, causing the next buildings overt to fall along with them.

The massive crashes were getting closer and closer, they began to run, it was the only way they would get out before it all closed in on them. "Hurry!" Maria screamed, holding the two of them by their arms as she ran. Bless screamed and Shade sprinted to pull them along quicker, he wasn't fast like Sonic and Shadow, but he was faster than Maria, a weak woman, and Bless a little girl.

After about a minute of running, which felt like an hour to them, they could see the end of this falling area. "Come on, we're nearly there!" Shade said, pushing himself to his limits. He could see the end, they were getting so close. Bless, being the one in the back, got his by a small piece of concrete on here back, it didn't hurt that much but it meant one thing, it was so close.

"The suitcases!" Maria yelled, they threw them all forward, now they had to get themselves out. Bless was extremely close to getting crushed, she let out a few tears of fear as she ran. Shade had a gold of Maria's hand and Maria had a hold of Bless's hand. "JUMP!" Maria screamed. The two girls leapt forward, being flung forward with an extra boost by Shade.

They landed just out of falling range. There was a last few seconds of dust scattering and crumbling, then silence.

Maria and Bless looked around, they saw their suitcases… but they couldn't see Shade. "Oh no… SHADE!" Maria screamed her eyes filled with panic. They heard a small muffled cry. "Oh no… please no!" Maria ran over to the gigantic pile of crumbled buildings. On the edge was a little gap, she looked inside, and there was Shade, looking back at her.

"Hi…" he said nervously. The hole was big enough to be able to fit an arm through.

"Shade… how do we get you out!" Maria screamed, worrying like crazy.

"Umm…" he began to think, he pushed on the rubble around him, but a large piece above him slipped down, leaving less space between the top of his space and the bottom.

"I know… let's check the suit cases… and see if there's anything in there to help us!" Maria said in a frightened voice. She was shaking with fear and dread for her son, she went into her suit case to look for something. "What am I thinking… there's nothing in here!"

"We're gonna have to risk it… pull one of the pieces of rubble… and just hope that it won't make the rest fall…" Shade said, sounding sad.

"We can't do that…" Maria said, she was now crying.

"I'm just so glad it's me in here… and not one of you… after all… I am the one who suggested this." he said, sounding ashamed.

"No Shade… this isn't your fault… I should have said no… now we have to get you out!" Maria said. Bless came over too with a few long pieces of rubble. She passed them through the small hole to Shade. "What are you two doing?" Maria asked.

"I know why you're doing this Bless… they can act as pillars to keep the 'roof' above me up, while we remove the rock in front of me away… this should work." Shade said, he stood the make shift pillars up.

Once he as done, Maria and Bless started to tug on the large concrete block blocking Shade's exit. "Easy…" Shade said, sweating with nervousness. After a long and careful tug, it was out. Shade rolled himself out sideways as fast as possible, just before the whole think collapsed. He got up and dusted himself off, only to be crushed by Maria and Bless with their hugs.

"Shade! Never do that again!" Maria said, feeling as if her life had been drained from her. "I could have lost you…" she sobbed. Bless cried too.

Shade didn't want to cry like the girls, but he couldn't help himself, he was so happy to be free.

**Wow, I tried to get some excitement in there… not sure if it really made that exiting or not. **

**Lucy Labrado**


	5. Chapter 5

**What A long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 5: They Went EAST!**

That night, they managed to find somewhere comfortable enough to sleep, some flat ground opposed to piles of rubble and brick. They set up camp with the few supplies they had and tried to sleep. This was hard to do since they hadn't eaten all day, and Bless was still very uncomfortable… She wriggled about in her blanket, trying every position comfortable, but it was use. Maria was awoken by Bless' fidgeting. "Come on Bless… you're being ridiculous now… just go… there's a pile of rubble over there, you can go behind it where we can't see you." Maria said, sounding fed up.

"But-"

"I mean it… I'm not asking you now… I'm telling you… now go!" Maria said, folding her arms. Bless started to grumble as she got up and went to the most private place possible.

She came back a few minutes later looking embarrassed. "There…. that wasn't so hard." Maria smiled. Bless narrowed her eyes at her, like Shadow would have. "Don't you give me that look! You're more like your dad than you think you know." Maria said sounding annoyed. Bless couldn't deny, she just rolled over and went to sleep, not saying a word. She wasn't in the mood for talking.

Since they weren't that comfortable, they woke up early with just enough energy to get them through the day… but they were starving. "Mum… we need food." Shade said, grasping his stomach in pain.

"But how will we get it… we have plenty of money… but if we go up to the counter in any shop, we'll be seen." Maria said.

"I could steal something." Shade said mischievously.

"Don't you dare!" Maria said, "But we could use your stealth… you could take something… but leave some money on the counter!" Maria said. Shade and Bless looked at her with irritated expressions. "Wait…" Maria said, "Shade, don't you have a hoodie…. You could hide in that… and you're fast enough to run if they do see through the disguise… but be really careful."

"I will mum…" Shade said, he searched through his stuff, he had brought his hoodie, it was jet black.

"Reminds me of something your dad used to wear when he went out shopping sometimes." Maria sighed, remembering the long cloak Shadow would use to hide himself from the world.

"Cool." Shade smirked. Maria handed him some money and pointed him to the nearest safe building, there would be shops on the ground floor. Maria and Bless waited for him.

Shade made himself blend in with a crowd of people that went into the building so the guards wouldn't get suspicious. He then went into a grocery shop. He wondered what to buy, what would be filling?

He decided to buy three small cartons of milk and loaf of bread, that would be good enough for breakfast. So, he took what he needed and went to the counter. His eyes widened at the price, it would cost him nearly 15 Mobiums. Supply was so low though, prices were sky high. He handed over the money at the counter and left, holding the items in his arms.

With his hood still up, when the guards weren't looking, he made a dash for the exit. His heart was pounding, but he had to do it. He rushed through the double doors and ran back to his Mum and Sister. "I don't know if this is what you had in mind." Shade said nervously, putting it down on the ground by the suitcases.

"Hmm… good choice Shade… bread is a filling food, it should get us through the day." Maria said, she took out two pieces of bread and gave one each to both of them, she then took out a slice for herself. "So… how much did this all cost?"

Shade cleared his throat nervously. "15 Mobiums…" he said. Maria nearly spat her mouthful of bread out, but managed to keep it in. She swallowed hard,

"Well… we'd better make this last then…" she said looking stunned, slowly going through her bread. Bless had already shoved the whole piece in. "Bless… slow down…" Maria sighed. Bless chewed and swallowed it quickly.

"But I'm starving…" she groaned, waiting to receive her next piece.

"You have a big appetite… just like your Dad." Maria pointed out.

"I'm suddenly no longer hungry." Bless said, folding her arms.

"Don't be silly." Maria said, getting out another piece of bread and handing it to Bless. Bless took it and tried to eat it slowly this time.

They then drank the milk and moved on, packing the leftovers away. They carried on going east, they were lucky they hadn't misjudged their directions and gone West instead.

They went through this routine for a few days, stopping for food and drinks twice a day and sleeping at night, they got quite far east, leaving Station Square. "We're out of Station Square now… do you think we can settle down?" Shade said.

"Maybe…" Maria said. "Maybe we could travel for one more day…" this suggestion was met by a couple of groans from her Children. "I guess not then… we'll see how this goes." Maria said, going to the nearest safe house, beckoning for the two of them to follow.

They went to the doors, no hassle. They went to the desk at reception. "Excuse me…" Maria said to the female receptionist that was falling asleep, it was a human, so Maria didn't fully trust her.

She woke up with a shock, then looked at Maria with hatred. "What do you want." the woman said, looking down on her.

"We need a room… we've been travelling and-"

"You're them… oh my god… it's…" the woman said in shock, pointing at them.

"RUN!" Maria cried, the three of them made a dash for the exit before the receptionist could alert security.

Meanwhile in GUN headquarters, they got a message about the location of the Dooms, Maria, Shade and Bless. They had been told that they were East of Station Square. That is when Rouge got a call from the new commander. This new commander was the old commander's son, and he was very cross about the death of his father, and he wouldn't take any nonsense from anyone. He looked a lot like the previous commander, but younger.

Rouge was dreading this call, she went to the command room of GUN HQ to see what this prick of a commander wanted. She got inside, being met by a very angry look from the commander. "Yes… sir?" Rouge said reluctantly.

"West… that's what you told us!" he boomed.

"What?" Rouge had no idea what he was on about, until it popped into her head and she realised, she was in for a telling off.

"You told us… that those little rodents had gone _west_!" the commander sneered.

"Yes… because they did." Rouge said confidently.

"Okay then… if that is correct, explain this!" he sneered. "They were seen outside of Station Square, on the EAST!" he yelled, slamming his fist down on the desk.

"I… must have gotten it wrong sir… it was a very stressful time for me… they're my friends! I was very worried at that time!"

"If you got it wrong since you were worried then… why did you come back and confirm it… several times!" Rouge was beaten. "Is it because they're your friends?" Rouge nodded. "We wasted all of this time, all of these recourses! We sent everything west only to find out that they had gone east!"

"I'm sorry sir! But they are my friends! I had to help them! I promised to stick by Shadow! I couldn't even do that! So I had to help his family!"

"Rouge, we can no longer trust you… you're fired!" he roared. Rouge gasped, she had been fired from a job she enjoyed so much and worked so hard at. "We're also keeping a _very _close eye on you… you'd better hope we don't find any of those three guilty of anything serious… or we'll arrest you too, for assisting them! Now leave!" he said, pointing to the door.

A couple of GUN soldiers came through the door and took Rouge by the arms, then escorted her to the exits and shoved her out, she would have hit the floor if she hadn't used her wings to stay off the ground.

So, the soldiers most eastward, gaining on the three fugitives very quickly with their vehicles. Within half a day they were back in Station Square, through it and on the east of it. The three of them didn't stand a chance.

They were continuing their journey when they heard the sounds vehicles, riding over the rubble. They were made especially for rough journeys. Their location was certain, so the commander decided to come out as well to see their capture.

They turned around to see these big buggy like vehicles, they homed in on them and stopped, circling them. Maria grabbed Bless and Shade and held them close to her. "Don't move! We have you surrounded!" the commander shouted out of a bullhorn. He climbed out of his vehicle, and walked over to them, pointing his gun out at them so they wouldn't try to run away. "It's over vermin… you're all coming back to GUN HQ with us."

"Why?" Maria yelled. "We mean no harm!"

"Oh, but you do… Shade there attacked my uncle… he needs to be taken are of… and _she _had trouble written all over her!" her said pointing to Bless. Bless began to whimper, hiding her face in Maria's torso.

"Your uncle was hurting Bless! I did what I had to do!" Shade said furiously.

"Oh… so you don't deny it either… at least your truthful… but that doesn't help you at all… we're going to put a stop to your little family before it gets any bigger… we knew we should have sterilised Project Shadow when we had him."

"Wait… is that what you're going to do to us?" Maria said in disgust. The commander nodded. "That's awful! You can't do that to my kids!"

"We can and we will!" the commander said. He clicked his fingers and all of the surrounding soldiers in the vehicles got up and cocked their guns, pointing it at them. "Try and escape and you will be blown to bits!" he said confidently.

"Okay… we give up… we'll come with you… just don't hurt them." Maria said, starting to cry. She put her hands up and so did the kids.

"Such a shame didn't put up a fight… I wanted to spill some blood." the commander smirked, still pointing his gun at them. "Now… which one do I shoot?" he said sinisterly.

"Don't you dare! You heard us, we surrender!" Shade growled. There was an ear piercing shot and Shade fell to the floor. Maria screamed out bloody murder, was her son dead?

No, he was on the floor clutching his lower leg. "You bastard…" he hissed at the commander, shutting his eyes tight, hissing in pain.

"Now, come with us!" he said, walking behind them, pushing them forward, forcing Shade to get up and limp. Maria tried to help him, but the commander separated them by pushing Maria's shoulder with the tip of his gun. "Let him walk on his own… you're going to regret walking out so far now… we're going to make you walk all of the way back while we ride in our nice comfortable vehicles." he teased. "Now walk faster!"

They walked faster as they were asked, but Bless had trouble keeping up. She was shaking in fear and had trouble keeping her balance as they stepped over the piles of broken buildings. "Hurry up girl… or I'll shoot you too."

Bless let out a little squeal and hurried, for the sake of her health. After about then minutes of walking, she began to fall behind again. "I said hurry up!" the commander said, pointing the gun at her.

"I'm trying… I'm too tired!" Bless whined.

"Maybe this'll teach you then…" the commander mumbled, he put his finger on the trigger. Maria saw this and jumped in front of Bless. There was a loud bang, and Maria fell to the floor clutching her chest. "Oh… **** I wasn't meant to do that." he ran over to her.

Bless and Shade cried out, looking at their fallen mother with wide eyes, there was blood seeping out of her chest and back, her body was lifeless. Bless' mind went blank, she couldn't be dead, she was their only parent. The only reason she wanted to live on. "She's dead." the commander said, he too was shocked.

Bless fell to her knees and screamed out, bawling her eyes out. "Mummy!" she screamed. Shade was speechless, he wasn't even moving, he just looked at his now dead, mother. He then screamed out in rage, kicked the gun out of the commander hand, caught it himself an pointed it at him. The many soldiers pointed their guns at him.

"If even one of you shoots… I will kill him!" he yelled in a scarily angry voice, putting the gun against the commanders head while Bless began to scream. Shade backed up from the commander keeping the gun pointed at him, he got hold of Bless' arm and carried on moving back. The soldiers all had their guns pointed at Shade, following his every move.

"Let him go men…." the commander sighed, saving his own life by setting them free. Shade kept the gun in his hand while running off with Bless who was still screaming.

Now without any supplies or money, they were left to fend for themselves, no more Maria, no more of their loving mother.

**Who cried? :'( Also, link to a picture for this chapter on my profile. **

**Lucy Labrador**


	6. Chapter 6

**What A Long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 6: It's Not All Bad**

**Thanks for the reviews, SwiftShadow123, Cora Roz and Omega! **

Shade and Bless were hiding between a few piles of rubble. **(How many time have I said the word 'Rubble' now!) **They were nicely hidden within them, so if GUN started up the search again they wouldn't be found that easily. Shade was sitting against one of the piles, his eyes looked lifeless, his body limp, though he was alive. Instead of crying, he went into a deep depression. A nice quiet way to deal with the death of his mother, Bless was doing the absolute opposite though.

She was kicking the nearby wreckage, breaking it even more, and crying out like a child, though, she was a child. "It's not fair!" she screamed out, eyes still flooding with tears. "It's all his fault! I hate him! Why couldn't he at least be here for that! He could have saved her then!"

"Be thankful that you were the only one who wasn't shot okay?" Shade said angrily, pointing to his leg which was bandaged with one of the sleeves of his T Shirt. "You know what I think… I think it would have been better if you were shot." he said, baring his teeth.

"Why? How could you say something like that!" she sobbed.

"You wouldn't have died… you have Dad's immortality! You would have been living, and none of us would have died!" he shouted in frustration.

"No… I'm not immortal… I'm not… she didn't do that for nothing… please Shade… she didn't." Bless said, becoming delirious.

"I'm not gonna lie to you… it's true…" Shade said, closing his eyes and folding his arms. "Why else would Mt Towers have his eye on you… and the commander go to shoot you… when he killed mum, he didn't seem too happy… he didn't want to kill any us Bless, and he was going to shoot you!"

"NO!" Bless screamed. "I'm not immortal… I'm not going to live forever… I'm not… please…. No…" she shook. She ran to Shade and buried her face in his tummy. Shade wrapped his arms around her.

"I'm sorry." he said calmly. "But you are… but that's a good thing… isn't it?"

"Dad didn't like being immortal… he said so himself." Bless said still crying. "And he passed his curse onto me…"

"At least now… I won't lose you… the only relative I have left…" Shade said, hugging Bless lovingly, tears started al fall from his eyes now.

"But… this means I could lose you-"

"You won't lose me… I will do everything possible to make sure I stay alive for you… for mum."

"How are we going to survive now… with no food… no money… nothing." Bless asked, wiping her tears.

"We could go back for our stuff… but that's a huge risk… besides… mum kept the money in her pocket…" he said, holding back another urge to cry. "We're going to have to steal…" he said, thankful that he was still in his hoodie, and that it wasn't lost. Bless looked worried. "Well, _I'll _haveto steal…" he corrected himself.

"But mum said-"

"It's the only way Bless… do you want to starve?" Shade said. "It should be easy with this…" Shade said, taking the gun out of his pockets.

"You're not going to use it, are you?" Bless asked, looking afraid.

"No… but if I point it at people, they'll give us what we need… and if things go out of hand, I'll run… it's simple… but I'm sure just putting things in my pocket will work just as well. Do you want something now?"

"No… I don't feel like eating…" Bless said, cuddling up to Shade again.

"Me neither… I'm too sad to eat…" he sighed. Bless wasn't listening though, she'd fallen asleep. Shade decided that it would be best if he slept too, so he closed his eyes and waited for the sleep to take over.

Bless didn't have such an easy sleep though. The corrupted father of her imagination had taken over her mind yet again. "Oh… Maria…" he said sounding truly hurt. "How could you do this to _my _Maria?"

"I… didn't do it…" Bless shook.

"It was _you _he was trying to shoot… it really should have been you to take the shot! You're so selfish!" Shadow cried out, he leapt at Bless and pinned her to the floor with his clawed hands. "I'll teach you to kill me wife!"

Bless screamed out, there was no way she could be stronger than her dad. "Please… don't hurt me!" despite her plea, Shadow began to strangle her, she struggled to get out of his grasp, but it was no use. She was getting weaker and weaker. She screamed out as loud as she could, but it wasn't very clear as her airways were blocked.

The dream world started to fade and the real world flashed before her, she gasped out, pulling away from Shade, she started to breathe heavily. "Whoa! What's wrong?" Shade said, pushing himself to sit upright. "Did you have another one of those nightmares?" Shade asked, rubbing his eyes. Bless shook her head slowly, looking to the floor, making no eye contact with him. "What are these nightmares about anyway? You've been having them ever since this disaster and you never told anyone about it…" Shade said gently.

"I don't want to talk about it… it's silly…" Bless said, shutting her eyes tight as if it would keep everything out.

"I have silly dreams sometimes… please tell me…" Shade said.

"No… I can't…" Bless said. Shade sighed, laying back again, he had decided to give up and leave her alone. "Shade… I'm hungry…" Bless complained. Shade sighed and tried to get up.

"Oww… I can't get up… my leg hurts too much when I move it." Shade said and grasped it tightly to stop the pain. He grunted in pain, crying out a little, a few tears escaped his eyes.

"Shade… oh no… what do I do to help you!" Bless yelled in panic.

"You don't do anything… I'll just wait for the pain to pass… it's ok…" Shade grunted, "Oww! No… it's not going to go away! The bullet's still in there!"

"We need a doctor!" Bless squealed.

"No! No doctors! We can't ask for help… or we'll be captured!" Shade said. "I'll have to get it out myself!" he said, unwrapping the bandage. He have out a masculine cry of pain as he did so, "I can't believe I'm going to have to do this!" he yelled out, he stuck his little finger into his wound an started to fish out the bullet.

He cried out in agony, he had never felt this much pain before. Bless watched in horror as more blood poured out of his wound, then the bullet, it popped out of the would along with his finger, rolled off his leg and made a small clinging sound as it hit the floor.

He stopped screaming, and went silent, breathing heavily. "It's over… finally…" he said, calming down. He covered the wound over with the bandage again, tightly so it would stop bleeding quicker. "That actually feels a bit better… but it still hurts like hell…." he groaned.

"I guess there wont be any food then… but that's ok… I don't want you to be even more hurt." Bless said an sat down by him.

"Oh… this is going to be a long night… or day… I have no idea what time it is… I wish I had a watch…" Shade said. "This constant darkness thing is really annoying…" he began to fidget with this t shirt, looking nervous. "I really wish I could walk right now…"

"Why?" Bless asked.

"I have to… you know… _go_…" he said, his cheeks turning red.

"Oh…" Bless said, having no idea what to do about it.

"I have to get up…" he grunted. He slowly got up, keeping his wounded leg off the ground. He began to lose balance. Bless ran over to help him stay up. "Aww… thanks Bless…" Shade said and smiled. She helped him walk over to an appropriate place to go. "Thanks so much… you can… you know… go now… I think I can stand by myself." he said, so Bless walked a distance so Shade didn't feel as if he was being watched.

She also helped him back to sit down. "Okay now?" Bless asked him, as he settle down again.

"So much better… thanks…" he sighed with relief, "Maybe… if I sleep a few more hours… my leg will heal better." Shade suggested and laid back, trying to relax. "I hope the pain calms down enough for me to sleep…" he groaned. Bless began to shiver, she was only wearing a thin T shirt. Shade took his hoodie off and gave it to her. "There… that's nice and thick… put it on… I'll want a turn later though." he said and gave it to her. Bless smiled at him and put it on, she cuddled into him again as they went to sleep, both of them feeling a bit better in each other.

They stayed in that area for a couple more days, until Shade could walk again. He was now able to get some food, he would have to plan this well, and not get caught so he didn't have to run, his leg wasn't fully healed yet.

He went into one of the safe houses with his hood up, so we wouldn't stand out in the crowd, he went into the one of the food shops and pretended to browse. When no one was looking he slipped a small loaf of bread into his pocket, it was a big pocket at the front of the hoodie, and left.

He ran back to Bless, he's been successful, no one had seen him. All was okay. They shared the bread between them and moved onto somewhere new, he couldn't keep robbing the same shop or they would get into him.

"Shade… don't you feel bad for doing this?" Bless asked, looking sad.

"To be honest… a little bit… but no one wants to treat us right… so they brought it upon themselves." Shade said, a bit of anger in his eyes.

"You're mad at everyone?" Bless asked. Shade nodded. "Like I'm mad at dad…"

"Yeah…" Shade sighed. "Bless… I think I'm starting to agree with you on some levels about dad… if what mum said was true, that he does care about us then not so much… but, because he's not here for us at this awful time, I'm kind of annoyed with him." he said sadly, he couldn't believe he was finally agreeing with Bless about this, even if it was only a bit.

Shade got out the bread and they began to eat it. It felt so good to eat again, even if they didn't have drinks to wash it down with. After having a few slices each, Bless started to complain, "Shade… I'm really thirsty… we need something to drink…" she groaned. Shade rolled his eyes and got up.

"Take more bread if you need to while I'm gone." he sighed an went back in. He felt even more uneasy this time, he may be recognised. He started to look at the drinks, he could get milk again, but that was getting boring, and this shop had bottled water, great! He looked to see if there was anyone else on the aisle with him, there was jus one turned the corner to leave him alone. Perfect, he shoved two small bottle of water in his pocket quickly and slowly made his way out, so it didn't look like he was running away.

He'd been successful again. "I hate this…" he sighed when he got back and gave one of the bottles to Bless. She started to gulp it down. "Hey, slow down!" Shade yelled. "I'm not going back in there… it has to last…"

"I couldn't help myself…" Bless said looking sad.

"It's okay… you still have some left… let's get a move on…" Shade said and helped her up. "If I get used to this, maybe I can steal you a treat." he enticed her and they began to walk again, carrying the bread and water with them.

"Shade… will we ever stop one day?" Bless asked.

"No… we can't… unless we find someone that we can trust. You never know who's going to reveal us to GUN."

"But this is tiring…" Bless said. "We have to walk every day… and it's making my legs hurt so much." she whined.

"Well get used to it… once we find another safe house to steal from, we'll settle down again for a couple of days, ok?" Shade said. "I wish I knew where we were… we could be in station square right now… but there's no way to tell… everywhere looks the same! We could be getting closer to GUN HQ for all we know!"

"I hope we're not… and if we are… you still have that gun, right?" Bless asked, Shade nodded. "They all do what we ask when you have it. But you're not going to use it… are you?"

"I may have to… but only if I need it as a last resort… for the sake of our survival…" Shade said with determination. Bless didn't like the sound of it, but she had to accept. She hoped they wouldn't be in a situation like that ever.

They carried on travelling for days, days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, which brought them to a much loved time of year. Christmas. Where ever they went, that had inhabitants, they saw Christmas decorations. They were happy to see the beautiful colours for one, all they were seeing all year was grey, brown and orange.

By now, fires as died down, to leave wastelands and in lower grounds lava pools formed. They had to keep on high ground, or they would meet a terrible fate.

On they day that they guessed was Christmas eve, they began to think of their parents again and how they missed them, they would always give them presents and a lovely Christmas dinner. It looked like no one was having a big Christmas this year, as most people were only just able to buy the food.

Bless went to sleep, hoping she would have a nice dream this time, one about Christmas, about opening presents, or for her dream father to treat her nicely for the holiday.

She was in the world of emptiness again, only wearing a Christmas hat this time. Something the would never have a in the real world. Then she saw him, Shadow, the evil corrupted one she knew. He was sneering at her, getting closer and closer as he walked up to her. He snatched the hat off of her head and ripped it in two. "Why celebrate with the rest of them… you have nothing _to _celebrate! What are you going to celebrate? The fact that you're all alone this Christmas!"

"I was just trying to have some fun…" Bless said, trying to hold back her tears.

"Stupid girl… you're not getting anything this Christmas… but it's not because there simply isn't anything left to give no… it's because you're pathetic…" Shadow spat. "You don't deserve anything… not even this hat!" he said and threw it behind him.

"You're a- a monster!" Bless screamed. "I hope you're suffering this Christmas too!" she screamed out, but then she felt him fade away.

"Bless, wake up! It's Christmas morning! Look what we have!" she heard Shad say excitedly, he was shaking her gently.

"Wha…" Bless said sleepily, opening her eyes. Then she saw it, piles of food and a few toys in front of her. "How!" she squealed with joy, she got up and ran over to the pile, there was sweets and a few plush toys, simple gifts, but much appreciated.

Shade watched her and yawned, Bless saw this yawn, he looked really tired. "You did this… didn't you…" Bless asked curiously.

"No… it was… Santa…" he yawned, then smirked, so did Bless "Ok… it was me… stayed up all night… I was just going to get a few supplies to we could have a nice feast today… but one of the stores was giving things away for those who didn't have much… like us… they don't know who I am though, thankfully." he smiled. "So, we have a happier Christmas than expected." he cheered and hugged her tightly.

"I wish I could have gotten you something." Bless said sounding guilty.

"No… this is for both of us… just pretend you helped me get it… besides, seeing you happy is enough for me." he said, he walked over to the pile and took out a bar of chocolate, "Let's start this… you in the mood for chocolate?"

"YEAH!" Bless cheered. They opened up the packet and started their day with a treat.

**Sorry if you think the Christmas thing is a bit out of place. I just wanted something to lighten the mood. **

**Lucy Labrador**


	7. Chapter 7

**What A Long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 7: A Place To Stay**

**Thanks for the many reviews! **

The two of them travelled for about another year, walking and stopping and travelling some more, until one day. They were walking as usual, moving onto the next city, when they heard a voice call them. "Psst! Hey, over here!" it hissed Bless and Shade turned to their right to see a light blue female hedgehog with long scruffy quills, hiding behind a pile of rubble, she looked like she was about the same age as Shade. She waved to them and beckoned for them to come over to her.

The cautiously walked over to her. "Hi… my name's Heather… do you two need a place to stay?" she said kindly.

"How do we know you aren't going to call GUN on us." Shade said, folding his arms, he was ready to run though.

"No way… I'm not going to do that… come down here with me." she said and crouched down, crawling under a large piece of rubble, and seemed to disappear into darkness. Bless and Shade looked at each other then followed too.

Once they got into the gap, they realised there was a tunnel leading to an underground building, it looked like it used to be the basement of a once standing building. "Whoa… what is this place?" Shade asked.

"A small group of us live down here… because we can't afford to live in one of the safe houses…" the Heather explained. "I'm here because my parents are dead… I guess you two are without parents too."

The two of them nodded sadly. "Well, hopefully you'll have a better life here. Do either or you have any skills that could help our little community?" she asked politely.

"I'm good at stealing supplies." Shade boasted. Heather looked down to Bless,

"How about you?"

"I'm immortal!" she said sweetly. Shade's eyes widened, he started to look nervous.

"Well… that… could come in handy…" Heather said, breaking the awkward silence between them. "Would you like to tell me your names?" she asked politely. Shade liked this girl, she was very nice.

"I'm Shade, and this is Bless." Shade said, pointing to Bless as he introduced her. "So… do we get a room of some sort?"

"Yes… there are a few rooms left… there's a few of us living here, there's no one over the age of eighteen though… we're all teenagers or kids." Heather explained.

"What happens when we turn into adults then?" Shade asked worriedly.

"Nothing… you just stay… no one's really gotten older yet though… we only found this two months ago." she said and showed them to their room. It had an area of about 3 metres squared, so it was just big enough for them to have a few belongings and to lie down and sleep.

"Thanks." Shade said to her. He dropped his few belongings down onto the floor, on top of the few pillows that were in the corner. He had a few coins of money, they had found a few Mobians worth of change over the years, a small plastic bottle and one slice of bread in a packet that once had a full loaf of bread and the gun.

Heather noticed the weapon that came from his pocket. Shade noticed her uneasy look. "Oh… don't worry… I've never used it… nor threatened to use it… well… I did once, it was our only means of survival… though I never pulled the trigger." he explained.

"Okay… please… don't use it in here…" she pleaded.

"Of course I won't… it's more of like… a charm to us… it was the gun that was used to kill our mum." Shade said sadly. Heather looked at the two of them sympathetically.

"Shade… I'm hungry…" Bless whined, Shade pointed to the last piece of bread on the floor in it's packet.

"It's gone a little stale, but it's all I have." Shade said, Bless went to eat it. "Will we get any food… or do we have to go and find it ourselves?" Shade asked Heather.

"We have supplies… but you must contribute to it… you know… help us." Heather said.

"Fair enough." he said, and smiled at her. "So… who else is living here… just…. Friends?" he asked curiously.

"Yep… just friends… all girls… we're glad we found you." she said, winking and she left.

"Wow… I bet they are glad to have a strong guy like me on the team instead of just girls…" Shade said, sounding proud, he looked down at Bless who was still nibbling on the bread. "I wonder if they have a clock… I'd really like to know what the time is… not known it for over a year now!" he said and went out to find something that could give him the time.

Bless was now all alone, she picked up one of the pillows, it wasn't the comfiest pillow she'd ever felt in her life, but it was the most comfortable she'd felt even since she and Shade were alone. She put it on the floor, lay her head down and fell asleep, she couldn't help herself, it was too cosy.

However falling asleep only meant one thing, Shadow! He was stood there again, a sinister look on his face. "You may have found a safe place to stay… but you'll get caught eventually… it's inevitable!" he growled.

"No it's not! We haven't heard from GUN in over a year! They must have forgotten about us!" Bless said with confidence.

"But they'll come back for you one day, I assure you of that. It's _never _over for us! We may get out little breaks from GUN… but they're always going to come back one day with better weapons and better plans and better trained soldiers! They are going to catch you…"

"And you think they'll find us down here?" Bless said, sounding unconvinced.

"You're a little too confident girl… you're too much like me… you may have my strengths… but you also have me weaknesses, remember that." he reminded her.

"And… what are those strengths and weaknesses?" she asked.

"Work it out yourself… you're old enough to realise what's good about you and what's not!" he sneered. "Like this one… advantage, ability to use chaos control, disadvantage, it easily tires you out and… you may not even _know _how to use it, because I'm not here to teach you." he said mischievously.

"So… I have powers like you… but I'll never know how to use them because you're not here? You bastard! All another reason to hate you!" she screamed.

"Quiet! You'll wake your new neighbours…" Shadow said, his voice fading away, Bless knew what this meant.

He eyes shot open and she sat upright to see Shade burst through the door. "Bless! What's wrong, why were you screaming?" he said in a panic.

"I was… sleeping…" Bless said nervously.

"Oh… that explains everything." Shade said, sighing, she knew she always had these nightmares but never knew what they were about. "Do you want me to stay?" Shade asked.

"Can I come with you?" Bless asked.

"What… to do boring work and stuff?" Shade said, but Bless knew he was lying. She narrowed her eyes at him. "Fine… come on…" Shade sighed, Bless got up and they went to see Heather in her room.

Shade knocked and waited for the reply. "Come in." Heather said from inside, so Shade opened the door, gently pushed Bless inside and followed her in.

"Oh… you have your sister with you this time." She said. "What was wrong just now?" she asked.

Bless just looked to the floor, not wanting to talk about it. "It's nothing serious." Shade explained to Heather. "She wanted to come with me… it must be lonely in that little room."

"Where are your friends right now?" Bless asked her.

"They're out getting supplies…"

"Will they be okay… are you sure they won't need help?" Shade asked.

"No… they're completely fine." Heather smiled. Then they heard a few bangs near the entrance, it sounded like they'd come back with the supplies. "Here they are now… I'll introduce you two to them." she said and led them out of the room and to the exit.

That's where Shade and Bless saw three girls carrying crates of supplies, but they weren't what Shade had expected. They had big muscles and were wearing masculine clothes, unlike Heather who was very feminine. Shade was speechless. "I see… why you wouldn't need help…" he said nervously, feeling uncomfortable around these girls, they seemed more manly than himself.

The three girls were also hedgehogs, they all looked very similar, their fur all shades of yellow. "Shade, Bless, this is Amber, Saffron and Topaz!" she said, "Triplets, as you may have noticed."

"Yeah… hi…" Shade said anxiously.

Later that evening at about 6pm, which Shade was glad to know, he'd not known the time in so long, they sat down to a meal. Shade and Bless were mesmerised by the variety! They'd gone from eating just bread to eating meat, vegetables and bread! They ate it thankfully, spooning up every last crumb on the plate, chewing the juicy meat and soaking up the last drops of gravy with their bread. "Thank you!" they both said at the end, finally feeling full for the first time in ages.

"You're welcome." Heather giggled. "I'm guessing you'll love breakfast tomorrow!"

Shade and Bless looked at each other in excitement, they wondered what amazing food they would have for breakfast. "You need to eat a lot… you've probably lost a lot of weight since you left home."

"Oh yes…" Shade said. "So… now what do we do to pass them time?" he asked.

"Just hang out… I'll tell you if you're needed for anything." Heather said, she got up from the table and picked up the empty plates, she then left with them.

"Wait… Heather… don't you want help with those!" Shade said urgently and chased after her. This left Bless alone with the triplets, in an awkward silence. Not liking the atmosphere between them, she got up and went back to her room.

Shade was in the small kitchen with Heather, helping her with the washing up. "So… how old are you two?" she asked Shade.

"Oh… I'm sixteen, nearly seventeen.… and Bless is twelve." Shade told her. "What about you?" he asked her.

"Just turned seventeen… how long until you turn seventeen?" she asked him.

"Well… if I've kept track of the days correctly… two weeks." he said, sounding unsure. "Do you know the date?" he asked nervously.

"November 5th." she giggled.

"WHAT! That means… I'm already seventeen… damn… I didn't do that good a job at keeping track."

"That's good then… looks like we're the same age." Heather said, giggling at Shade's mistake.

"Yeah…" he said, sounding slightly disappointed. "Oh well… at least I'm older now." he said, smiling at Heather.

Bless was waiting for Shade to come back to the room, she was bored and had nothing to do. For all this time, she and him would talk to pass the time, but now he was busy. She also needed the toilet, but didn't know where the bathroom was, and she didn't want to go peeping around to look for one in case she went somewhere she wasn't supposed to. "I can wait until Shade comes back." she told herself. But half an hour passed, and no sign of him. "Come on Shade…" she groaned, crossing her legs. She got up, she would go and find him, but had second thoughts, she didn't fully know her way around the place, so she sat back down again.

Another half an hour passed and Bless wished she hadn't asked for that second glass of juice at tea time. She looked at the new clock that was put in their room, Shade had insisted that it was put there. It was nearly eight o'clock at night. "Why is he doing this to me… I really have to go…" he groaned, she got up and ran out of the door to go and look for Shade.

She found the dining room and looked in the kitchen, no one was there. Then she ran to look in Heathers room, thinking Shade would be there. She knocked on the door. "Come in!" came both Shade and Heather's voices.

Bless flung the door open in hurry. He was there. "Aww… Bless… didn't you know where I was?" Shade asked, getting up and leading her inside the room to come and sit down with them. She sat down in discomfort.

"I was waiting for you to come back to our room Shade…" Bless said sadly.

"Aww… well, next time if I don't come back, I'll be here." Shade said. "Is there something wrong… you don't look very well." he said, looking at Bless.

"I'm… ok…" she lied. Shade took her by the hand and brought her outside the room. Now that they were in private, Bless told the truth. "I really need to go… but I don't know where the toilets are." Bless said urgently.

"Oh… me neither… I'll ask Heather." Shade said.

"No… then she'll know I have to go…" Bless whined. "And it's embarrassing enough telling you…"

"Then… how will we know?" Shade said folding his arms. Bless sighed in defeat. "I'll go and ask her then." he said. Bless stood outside waiting desperately. After a few seconds, Shade and Heather came out, Heather was going to show them to the toilets.

"I'm so sorry… I should have shown you to them when you first arrived… I know… to avoid confusion again… how about I give you two a tour now?" she said.

"No… show us to the toilets first!" Bless yelled.

"Of course… after that." Heather said and led the two of them to the toilets.

Bless ran inside and didn't come out for a few minutes. She came out looking relived, but embarrassed. "So… how about that tour now?" Heather said.

"Sure." Shade said, Bless tagged along with them, but only because she had to, she wasn't liking this very much.

**Lucy Labrador**


	8. Chapter 8

**What A Long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 8: Nine!**

After a few days Shade and Bless had settled in, this was life for them now, certainly better, and it was nearly Bless' thirteenth birthday. She had noticed that Shade was spending way too much time with Heather, she had her suspicions, could they be in love? This was bad news for Bless, because it meant she had to spend every day alone in her room, without Shade.

When it came to her thirteenth birthday Shade was with her, he'd gotten her something small, but Bless appertained since it was really hard to get stuff during this time. She would also get a small birthday cake in the evening.

She was finally a teenager, she could finally experience those teenage things Shade went through. She felt on top of the world, she wasn't just a child any more.

In the evening they had a meal of Bless' choice, Pizza! As they all sat down to eat, Bless. Shade, Heather and the triplets, (who never said anything) Shade remembered something. "Hey… when I was younger… I remember mum telling me that dad used to be a pizza delivery boy." Shade said with an amused grin. "He found it so embarrassing… I know I would."

"Wow Shade… how about we _all _talk about the very person I hate on my birthday!" Bless exclaimed. Shade sighed.

"I was just trying to break the silence…" he said sadly, dropping his slice of pizza onto his plate. Bless felt very bad then.

"I'm… sorry…" she said, feeling ashamed of herself, this didn't stop her eating though, digging into the soft bread and soggy melted cheese. "This is really good… who made it?"

"I did." Heather said. "It's not the best but…"

"But it is the best! We'll… it has been a _long _time since I had pizza…" Bless said, unable to stop eating.

"There's seconds in the oven if you want some later… Shade told me you like Pizza." Heather smiled, she turned to Shade who gone back to eating his pizza slowly. **(Damn, now I'm craving a pizza!) **

After Bless had finished her Pizza, and Shade's since he wasn't that hungry, they waited a while for the food to settle in their stomachs before they got out the cake. They lit the candles and began to sing happy birthday to Bless.

As they were singing, suddenly Heather bent over looking very ill, she then put her hands over her mouth and ran off. They all stopped, watching her as she ran off. Shade ran after her.

This left Bless alone with the triplets, again, she didn't like them so she ran off to her room instead, she wouldn't bother with her birthday cake.

Then minutes later Shade came back to Bless, he found her in their room crying. "Bless… I'm sorry I ran off… but, Heather was sick, I had to help her…"

"It's okay… I'm stupid enough to even think I'd have a decent birthday…" Bless said, wiping the tears from her eyes.

"Do you want some cake?" he asked, pointing to the direction that the kitchen was in.

"No… not really…" Bless said.

"Do you want your pizza… I'll deliver it to you…" Shade smirked. Bless nodded, so he ran off to get the pizza. Bless couldn't wait to feast on another pizza, she could taste it already… or maybe it was jus the after taste of the last one.

Shade brought it into her, it was warm soft and steaming, already cut up so she could take the pieces freely. "Want some?" she asked Shade while picking up her first piece, the cheese dangling down off the sides.

"Okay then…"Shade said, he sat down with her to eat a slice. They shared the pizza and talked to each other until late at night, Bless was so happy that it wasn't such a bad birthday after all since she got to spend some alone time with her brother and eat her favourite food.

For the first time in years, when she went to sleep that night, she dreamt about good things instead of having nightmares, her mind was free.

A few months later and Bless started to notice that Heather had gained some weight, mostly in the abdomen. It looked a lot like she was- NO! she wouldn't say anything in case she was wrong or upset someone. Maybe she could ask Shade though when she saw him alone again.

She thought about the very act Heather and Shade would have had to had performed for her to be pregnant. "No… he didn't…" he said to herself in disgust. But it was almost certain, as Heather seemed to be getting bigger and bigger every day.

After a few more weeks, she couldn't hide it any longer. She decided to make an announcement to everyone. "Okay… everyone…" she said nervously while standing up in front of them all, Shade was by her holding her hand. "I'm… pregnant."

"I KNEW IT!" Bless yelled. "How could you do this to me Shade!" she screamed and ran to her room crying.

She knew now, Shade would not spend any time with her, as it had been for these few months, he'd be busy looking after Heather because she was pregnant, then looking after the baby when it was born. She would be left alone, and she didn't want that. Shade was always her only friend!

Shade and Heather decided they would have a small wedding within the shelter, it may not be recognised by the people outside as a marriage, but it was the best that they could do. Bless and the triplets watched as they said their self written vows to each other and promised to stay together forever.

After this little ceremony, they had a small white cake to share, it was just big enough for one slice each. Bless was feeling even worse, she knew now that Shade would not spend time with her any more, he had a wife now.

Heather continued to get bigger and bigger. Much bigger than she should have been. "Well… maybe it'll be a multiple birth!" Heather said in panicked voice. Shade also started to panic. "Or it's going to be _really _big!" she said, feeling faint. "How will I push _that _out!"

"We should get you checked up on… do you know anyone that can help you?" Shade asked.

"No…" Heather said nervously. "Do you?"

"Well… I know few adults that my parents were friends with… they may be able to help… they probably know about this than I do… and I think I remember their numbers… I need to a mobile phone." he said.

"I think we have one somewhere… but it may have run out of credit… if it has, then it's useless." Heather said, she went to find it. She came back smiling, "Yes, and it has just enough credit for a reasonably long call… try it." she said and handed it to Shade.

Shade tried his hardest to remember Rouges phone number, he typed it in then waited. He then heard a voice, "Hello?" it said, it was Rouge.

"Hey… uh… Rouge… it's Shade…" he said nervously.

"SHADE! How are you! Where are you! Are you okay! Where's you mum!" she said asking frantic questions.

"Okay… slow down.. I'm fine… kind of… I'm… somewhere… I'm not really sure…" he didn't answer the last question. "I have a little problem and.. I hope you can give me some clues as to what's wrong…" he said feeling even more nervous. "You see… I have this friend-"

"What's going on?" Rouge asked in a stern tone, seeing through the 'friend' lie.

"I got a girl pregnant!" he yelled frantically. Rouge gasped. "But she's okay… however… she's only three months along and she's HUGE already… do you know why… or any possible explanation?"

"Wow Shade… well… the only thing that comes to mind is, multiple births… maybe she's going to have triplets or something, if she's that big already."

"Okay Rouge… thanks…" he said feeling a bit calmer.

"Could I talk to your mum for a sec?" Rouge asked. Shade went pale and silent. "Well?"

"She's… busy…" he said then hung up. "A friend of mine say that she thinks it just multiple birth… nothing to worry about." Shade said giving her the phone back.

"NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT!" Heather screamed out. Shade leaped back in surprise. "I could be having triplets! This is a disaster!" she yelled.

Many months passed and Heather grew even more, the bump was huge, the biggest any of them had ever seen. She couldn't get out of bed, she would be in pain if she got up. "How big are these babies!" she cried out as the time was drawing near. "I don't want to do this…" she cried.

"Calm down… it'll be okay…" Shade reassured her even though he was really worried himself.

"Why did you do this to me?" she cried. Shade didn't know what to say, he was looking forward to when the babies were out and Heather was okay again.

Bless was alone in her room as usual, envying Heather. Heather had taken her brother from her and now Bless was always alone.

A day later, the babies were being born. Heather was screaming, after a few hours the babies were ready to come out. After a long struggle, one came out. After that the third and second were easier. "It's over?" Heather asked. But then she felt another coming through.

"No! There's a fourth one!" Shade said in shock as he looked down to the 'exit'.

"WHAT!" she shrieked, pushing it out. It had to be over now, but it wasn't. There was another two within the next ten minutes. "Shade… I'm really scared…" Heather shook.

Shade was speechless… he also didn't have enough blankets for the six babies and Heather was still going. She screamed out again while another popped out, "This has to be over now…" Shade said, cleaning the next one up. "Is more than seven even possible!"

"It is…" she groaned as the labour still went on. Shade felt like fainting, he would have to look after these seven babies and counting. He thought to himself about all this time that they believed that they were triplets, and how so very far off they all were. At least it explained why she was so huge!

A final two more came out, and it was over. The pain died down a little and Heather fell asleep. This left Shade with nine new born babies. His mind went blank, what should he do? What if they were hungry! Heather could only feed two at a time! They had bottles to feed them, but he only had two hands!

He immediately ran to the kitchen to get nine small bottles of milk going for the hungry baby hedgehogs. He then brought them in, nearly dropping half of them before they all started crying. He started with two on the furthest left, putting the teats of bottles in their mouths gently, but the others started to stir. "No…" he whispered.

He needed help. Surely Bless could help him, and the triplets, even though they were strange. The five of them could tackle nine babies, no problem. He ran off to the find them, Bless first. "Bless… babies born… Heather's asleep… need help!" he said quickly and frantically, he then ran off to find the triplets.

They all followed him to the room where Heather and the newborns were. "I've got these two… four feed the others!" he said. Bless took one, and the other three had two each.

They were soon all fed, and asleep. Shade sighed with relief, Heather didn't seem to be waking up, she looked so peaceful, he went over to her and held her hand. "We have nine babies… I can't wait until you wake up so you can see them all." he whispered to her. She stirred a little but continued to sleep.

The triplets left but Bless stayed. "What are they called?" Bless asked.

"We haven't given them names yet… I haven't even gotten the chance to look at them properly…" he said and walked over to them. "I will when we bath them… they have to sleep now… I'll get some tubs ready for them… wanna help?" he asked quietly. Bless couldn't' deny, this could be the only time she got to spend with her brother forever now.

A few hours later, Shade had several tubs ready and warm for the babies, just in time since they _and _Heather had woken up. Shade cleaned them in the room so Heather could see, the first one he took out to clean was a girl. She was red and black with red eyes, this made Heather's eyes widen. The second one was the same, and the third! They were all red and black with red eyes. "How did this happen… they look nothing like us!" she exclaimed. "They look more like Bless…" she looked at him in disgust.

"You'd better now be thinking what I think you are!" he said, anger in his voice. "It must be the genes my dad passed down to me… besides, fur colour doesn't matter… if you look closely… this one has you nose… and this one has my eyes…" he smiled.

"Okay… I was getting a little worried there… wait… who _is_… you dad?" she asked in concern.

"Wait… you… didn't… know yet?" Shade asked nervously, he started to sweat.

"No… you said nothing… only that your mum was called Maria." she said curiously.

"Oh… well… you may not like this… but I'm actually the son of… _Shadow The Hedgehog…"_

Heather froze, she couldn't believe what she was hearing, she bared the grandchildren of the monster known as Shadow, she screamed out in devastation, she was the mother of nine black arms hedgehogs.

**Wow, Heather must feel awful, not a really happy day for her. **

**Lucy Labrador**


	9. Chapter 9

**What A Long Hard Life Bless' Story**

**Chapter 9: The Children**

**It's been a long time since I updated this story but I've had writers block for it. Maybe if I was getting more reviews I would feel as if this was more worthwhile.**

So, Heather and Shade went onto raise their nine children. There was a big problem of naming them all. They would have to come up with nine names. To make it easier they decided to name some of them after their grand parents. They picked the one that looked the most like Shadow and named him, Shadow. Next name was Maria so they did the same with that, picked the girl that had a biggest resemblance to Maria and named her after her grandmother.

Next was Heather's parents, who were deceased just like Shade and Bless', the names were Tiffany and David. They still had five to go though, so they used their own names, Shade and Heather. But still left three more.

"With now where to find out names from, this is getting hard." Heather sighed once they had used up all of the names. "What about your Grandparents?"

"Hmm… I don't know them…" Shade said, Maria had never told him about her parents, neither had Shadow and Shade didn't want to mention Black Doom so he was stuck. Heather sighed. After much though they named the last three Eclipse, Dusk and Scarlet.

Altogether it was five boys, Shadow, David, Shade, Dusk and Scarlet and four girls Maria, Tiffany, Heather and Eclipse. All nine of them would have to grow up in an old underground building, hiding away from the world to escape their capture. It was a nightmare at night when it came to getting nine babies to sleep. It annoyed everyone living there, not just the parents.

Bless was hating it. Shade now shared a large room with Heather and the babies which left her all alone for good. Shade really had no time at all to look after her. But it was okay since Bless had worked out how to do everything herself. She knew around the building and how to cook her own meals. They weren't very good meals but they were enough to live off.

Nine restless babies grew into nine uncontrollable toddlers, who were always running away from their parents when they could. Shade and Heather only had four arms between them and there was nine of them, a complete shortage of hands!

Bless had grown into an older teenager. Her body had grown as much as it ever would. She was now at her teenage state, the same as Shadow, in which she would never age. But this meant her dreams got more violent and twisted. The Shadow of her mind had found it better to torment her now that she was older. She dreaded going to sleep every night.

There he was again, them surrounded by pitch black nothingness. A sinister look on his face, as if he had something in mind this time. "Please… just leave me alone…" Bless shook, stepping back, but no matter how far and fast she went, her father always stayed the same distance away. She began to run, but it was still no use, he was standing still and yet her always stayed near her.

Shadow laughed malevolently, as she struggled and trembled. Shadow walked forward and his movement successful, unlike Bless'. He came over to her and grabbed her throat with one hand, and held one of her arms with the other hand so she couldn't run away. Bless began to gasp out, despite it being only a dream, she felt as if this had an impact on her body in real life.

She had stopped breathing. Before, when she was young Shade would be there to wake her up as soon as he noticed her struggling, however he wasn't there this time. He was with his wife and children instead so there was no one there to help her.

She tried to cry out for help, hoping doing this in the dream world would make herself do so in the real world as it was happening with her breathing. However it was a struggle, Shadow had a tight grip on her throat, it was no use. She began to cry since it was hurting her too.

Bless had now gone a long time without breath, eyes wide, looking at Shadow's sinister and evil look. Her head started to hurt and her muscles locked themselves up, she needed oxygen, but there was no way she could wake up. Her body had run out of oxygen, by now she would have passed out but nothing happened. Shadow noticed her pained but confused look and laughed.

He began to speak in a cruel voice. "Haha, don't you see what's happened, your body has shut down… you're unconscious… you're stuck with me now…" he hissed. Bless wanted to struggle but she was too weak, and stuck in her mind with Shadow. "At least you get to stay with me now Bless… something you've wanted for a long time… right?" he teased. "So… enjoy it while you can…" he said. Bless managed to let out a squeak of fear. Shadow threw her backwards and she hit a wall where there used to be nothingness.

In reality, Bless would have passed out, but she was already passed out. She had to endure the awful pain which felt so real. She was trapped in the hell of her mind, she hoped Shade would come and check on her soon.

Nevertheless, checking on Bless was the last thing on Shades mind. He was surrounded by toddlers, all screaming, crying or breaking something. Heather was exhausted and asleep in the bedroom and he didn't want to disturb her as always, so he was in it alone.

While grabbing a hold of David and Dusk, he saw little Shadow toddle out of the room, he had somehow managed to open the door. "No!" Shade cried out. Outside the children's' room it was dangerous. He put Dusk and David on their cots and ran after Shadow. He searched around the corridors, calling out for him. All of the doors were closed apart from one, that was open by ajar.

He went over to it, it was Bless' room. The lights were off, which made him curious, she'd normally have the lights on by this time, it was morning now. There was no sunlight coming through windows so they all used artificial light. He went inside and turned the light on by the switch on the wall.

He saw little Shadow sitting by Bless who looked as if she was passed out on the floor. At first Shade reckoned that Bless was just sleeping, but then he noticed there was no movement, not even slight movement, she wasn't breathing!

Shade ran over to her and picked her body up, laying her upright so that her airways would be cleared. She shook her gently, then a little harder as he became more worried, still no reaction.

In Bless' mind she was sure she could hear a faint voice. Someone was calling her name. She felt her airways clear, she could breathe again, and Shadow started to fade away as he looked at her like a disappointed father, disappointed in his own daughter. He faded from her sight and she came back to reality. She'd been saved.

Her eyes went from seeing Shadow in the darkness, his deep red eyes, olive skin and black and red fur, to seeing another set of deep red eyes, olive skin and red and black fur. Bless let out a scream, Shadow was there in front of her.

Her sight and other senses improved she realised it was only her nephew, Shadow who looked just like her dad. She calmed down as she realised it was only the toddler who was standing by her as she was sat against the wall.

She looked up at Shade who seemed to be relived at her revival. "What happened to you?" he asked her. Bless shrugged. "So… you don't know how you passed out then?" Bless shook her head and got up as if it was nothing. "Bless… don't act as if this isn't a big deal, because it is! You could have died."

"I'm immortal, remember… I wouldn't have died." she said. "It's nothing." she said solemnly. Feeling unwanted by the death glaring Bless, he picked Shadow up and left.

Bless sat back down again, cuddling herself into her pillows and blanket. She remember to stay awake though, she didn't want to end up Shadow's prisoner again.

Years crawled by and the toddlers grew into children with different personalities to each other. Even though they all looked a lot like Shadow, they didn't all act like him. Ironically Shadow 2nd acted nothing like Shadow 1st, his personality was completely different.

A lot of them were pessimistic and upset about not being free and having to hide away. A bit like Shadow and Maria felt when they were trapped on the ARK and wanted to go onto the planet below. These kids wanted to see what it looked like outside, but the exit was blocked off to them, and trying to escape meant that they were punished.

Shade didn't like being strict on them when they tried to escape, but it was for their own good. If one of them even showed as much as a finger outside of the door, they could risk getting them all known and caught. A lot more supplies were needed than ever before for them all, but they had the triplets to help them still and Shade went and risked his life getting supplies too.

Bless was hating this even more now. The kids were even noisier than when they were toddlers, especially when they were fighting or playing an exiting game. It reminded her of the noise at school that she had to put up with many years ago. Even though the children's rooms were several meters away, she could hear them loud and clear. The girls screaming, the boys shouting, the crashes and bangs as they all caused havoc in their rooms.

Bless was a lot like her dad in this way. She didn't like noise, or being disturbed, even when she wasn't even busy. She'd sit in her room, getting lost in her thoughts and memories, her tragic past sufferings and her lost happiness. Every night, she was tormented by an imaginary father and every day her mind was plagued with horrible memories.

It was like it was never going to end. She knew that one day GUN would get to them. Shadow had bet his chest fur on it, he always knew best and he wouldn't risk giving up something he loved so much if he wasn't sure about it. Even though this was only a part of her dreams.

Whenever she would hear Shade or the triplets leave, she would wait for them to return crying out that they'd been seen and they would be captured soon. It never happened but Bless had a strong feeling that it would.

She was waiting for the door and rubble to be broken away and all of them to be taken away, the children kicking and screaming and Shade fighting. All because they were the ultimate life form's family. **(A/N: Doesn't this remind you of the Jews in Nazi Germany? :/ )**

The children all knew about this, however didn't understand it. They didn't know who Shadow, their grandfather truly was. They'd never seen him before and Shade found it a little unfair to tell them all that Shadow 2nd looked just like him, that would be using him. When Shade told the story, he made his father seem like a lost and mistreated hero. However whenever Heather told the story, she made him seem like a villain and a monster, but those were the stories she was brought up on and told.

The children would all have to decide for themselves that they would think of their lost grandfather. Unlike Bless who for a long time, had a strong opinion on Shadow, her lost father, and exactly what she would do to him when she finally found him.

**It's been a while but it's finally done. I hoped you enjoyed this chapter and I'll see if I can get a few more chapters done by Christmas. **

**Lucy Labrado**


	10. Chapter 10

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 10: Hopelessness**

**Reached the 10 chapter mark. **

The children were fully grown and stopped ageing like Bless. They were all like her now, teenagers forever, never to grow old or weak, unaware of the suffering they would endure later on in their lives.

Now that they were older and competent of looking after themselves, they had a choice of leaving the shelter. Not surprisingly, but to Heathers horror, they had decided to leave. They wanted to see the world, the real world and go on adventures of their own.

They all left, to find partners of their own and carry on the family. Shade and Heather were worried about them all, but they couldn't stop it from happening.

The shelter was silent for the first time in many years. But it didn't feel good. It felt lonely and out of place. Bless was all alone in her immortality, the only one who looked like Shadow once again.

She wondered if it would stay like this forever or if at least one of them would return. Their parents had brought them up so well and they had just left without a goodbye. That was how fed up they were with their life underground. Even the ruined world outside was better for them.

Bless hoped that she could sleep easy that night, no more noise, no more snoring from the others. It was just Shade and Heather. The triplets had gone, they had found somewhere else to go, after being annoyed by the children when they were younger. So it was just the three of them. She hoped that they would spend time together as friends now that it was just the three of them and Shade and Heather were more grown up now.

When she fell asleep and entered her dream world, she was wrong. That night would not be any easier. Her memories and imaginary father still haunted after all of these years. He continued to hurt and tease her, mock and taunt her and every time she would beg for mercy, on her knees, begging for him to stop and leave her alone.

Shadow just sneered and tormented her even more. "Why are you begging for mercy? I'm just treating you the way you treated me." He hissed. **(Thanks for this wonderful idea CoraRoz.) **"You always treated me like crap… all because I had you as a child… it wasn't my fault! It's not like I wanted you to be born!"

Bless cried out in despair, was this all her fault? Did Shadow really feel that way about her? She was just an unwanted accident to him, is this why he never really returned to them?

She was suddenly awoken by Shade, who was shaking her awake. She noticed that he looked very annoyed. "Bless… you need to tell me about these dreams, it's the only way you're going to stop having them." he said in a frustrated voice.

"I'm not telling you anything… it's private." Bless said, refusing to talk or look at him.

"But it's disturbing _us _Bless! We were sleeping wonderfully before you started screaming again!" Shade yelled.

"Get out! You're no good for me!" Bless screamed and pushed him out, she slammed the door and leaning against it so that he couldn't come back inside. She couldn't take it any more, she felt like everyone was against her. She now truly hated her immortality, she wanted to end her life immediately. She felt that there was really no point in living on.

Once she was sure that Shade was gone, she ran out of her bedroom door, to the exit of the shelter, burst out and ran off into the distance, planning on never coming back.

She was now exposed to the outside world, something she hadn't seen in over a decade. Instead of masses of rubble where she was now, it was a long range or flat ground, it had been cleared, so was easy to walk across, however there was no where to hide if she saw a GUN soldier.

She was under the risk of being caught by GUN, but she didn't care. She felt the despair take over her and fell to her knees, giving up completely. She collapsed onto the ground completely, feeling her muscles give up and her life draining away.

She once again found herself in her dreams, Shadow was there, smirking. "Just giving up like that isn't going to end it you know… nothing will… believe me… I've tried so many times." he teased, walking over to her and grabbing her arms to pick her up. "It'll never end… you're going to have to endure an eternity of pain and misery… now deal with it!" he yelled at her.

For once, Bless didn't cry. She just gave a look of pure hate, holding back the tears as she felt the emotional pain physically cripple her. She fell to her knees once again. She felt as if her insides were being ripped apart in her chest… she wanted it all to end. On her hands and knees she started to beg. "Please… just kill me now… I can't take this any more… please…" she begged and started to sob.

"No… I want to see you suffer…" Shadow hissed, looking down on her as if she were a pile of rubbish. "You were an idiot to leave the safety of your home… you're definitely going to get captured now." he said confidently.

"I don't care… let them capture me…" Bless said, not sounding bothered. "I'm nothing to everyone now… so I might as well do everyone a favour and never go back…"

"Finally… you think correctly…" Shadow said, smirking malevolently. Bless felt the dream world slipping away again, she felt as if she was being picked up and carried away. She heard Shadow's evil laugh fade away as this was happening.

In her mind she was panicking, this was it. She'd been captured. She opened her eyes, expecting to see herself in the arms or a GUN soldier, but she didn't. She saw that it was Shade instead. She gave a groan, to was too weak to talk, her body still numb from the despair.

"You're stupid for running away Bless… you could have been captured… I could have lost you…" he said sadly as her carried her back as quickly as he could. "I know things have been bad between us lately but… you can't just run off thinking that you're unwanted…" he said and got back into the shelter.

Bless didn't listen though, she was lost in her depressed thoughts, feeling herself go limp again. Shade brought her to her room and put her down on her pillows and blankets gently. "Bless… stop this now… please… you're worrying me." Shade said, thinking her weakness was all just an act so she could get what she wanted. But she didn't stop, it was as if she was oblivious to her surroundings. She was just staring into space, no expression on her face at all. There was no movement from her either, it was if she were dead.

Shade shook her gently, and she looked at him for second then went back to her trance. This reminded Shade of how Shadow, his dad, acted sometimes, and how Maria had said that he got depressed sometimes. "Oh no… Bless… what's wrong with you? Is this my fault for neglecting you? I didn't realise you were this much like dad… I'm so sorry…" he said and broke down crying, wishing she would snap out of her weak and dejected state.

It took a few days of attention and pizza to make Bless her usual self again. But that didn't mean that she was happy and hyper. Just able to move and talk again. The two of them were sitting in Bless' room. "What happened to you Bless?" Shade asked softly. Bless shrugged again. Shade sighed irritably.

"I don't even remember…" Bless said, slightly growling.

"Well… do you remember what happened before you went into that trance of yours?"

"Yes…" she said, narrowing her eyes at Shade. He looked at her nervously. "But it isn't entirely your fault…" she admitted. "It's those dreams too… but I'm still not telling you about them." she said stubbornly.

Shade felt as if he was ready to snap at her, but he couldn't or Bless could end up depressed again, and they were running out of Pizza. "I just… really want this to end… I'm in so much pain… I want our family to be back together… you know, you me mum and dad… I miss it so much…"

"Bless… this was like… over 20 years ago… it's time to move on… I've moved on…" Shade said.

"Yes… because you've grown old and gotten and family! I haven't changed a bit! I should be 30 now but look at me!" Bless yelled. "So how can you expect me to move on!"

Shade just sighed, not knowing what to say. He had no idea what to do. Bless would stay young forever and she would live in the past forever. Nothing could be done to change it either.

Shade decided to give up on trying to make life better for Bless and left her to get on with her life and not waste her time. He would check up on her regularly to stop her from becoming lonely and depressed again.

Later on that year, when Shade went out to get supplies, he realised that the warehouse he usually stole from was shutting down. He couldn't believe it, he didn't know where the nearest one was apart from this one. Where would they get their supplies from now? He stole as much as he could and went home to tell Bless and Heather.

They were shocked to hear this and very worried. They'd have to ration their food even more now, and they were already rationing it a lot since they didn't have the triplets to help them! So, they lived on, eating less and less. No more Pizza or treats, which Bless was very irritated about.

Soon enough they were eating as little as a few slices of bread a day. "That's it! I'm fed up with this! I'll help you get more supplies if it means not having to live like this!" Bless said while they were sitting down the their meal of bread and water.

"No! You can't leave the shelter! You're a red and black hedgehog, so you'll be spotted easily!" Shade said. "We'll have to stay like this…" he sighed. "Maybe someone else will show up to help us or something."

"But… this isn't fair… we've been living like this for over a year now!" Bless complained.

"Well what do you expect! This is an underground shelter! We're wanted by GUN, we're not going to have a fancy life, are we!" Shade yelled angrily across the table at her. Bless looked back at Shade in hatred.

"I… hate you…" she hissed and then there was silence for a while until there was a large banging. Someone was knocking on the entrance door for the shelter, and they were knocking loud. It was as if they'd been found and a soldier had finally come to take them away, weather they came quietly or kicking and screaming.

Bless knew this day would come and she was ready for it. They slowly walked towards the door to see if they were right, the knocks continuing, getting louder and faster. Shade decided to be brave and open it, this was the only way the noise would stop.

He slowly made his way to the door, his heart rate increasing, this could be the end for them all. He reached for the handle and turned the latch…

**Lucy Labrado**


	11. Chapter 11

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 11: Darkness**

**I am very happy with the response of my readers with both this story and 'It Isn't The End' because the reviews seem to come in quickly and there's a lot of them. Thank you all so much. **

After what felt like hours the door was opened to reveal a read and black hedgehog with red eyes, furry chest and spikes. Bless froze for a second, could it really be? He was holding a tiny red and black baby in his arms and was crying. He passed the baby to Shade and fell to his knees, crying aloud. "Shadow… what's going on?" Shade asked him.

Bless sighed, it wasn't her dad it was her nephew. This was one of Shade's sons who had left about a year ago. He looked exactly like Shadow, which was why he was named after him. Bless was disappointed that her father hadn't come back, however this was nearly as good. She wondered what was going on.

As Shade held the baby he noticed that it was a bit wet and gooey, there was blood on it. "Shadow, please tell me!" he said, and gasped as he saw that it still had the umbilical cord on it.

Shadow, still on the floor sobbing, started to talk. "My girlfriend… she…" he took a long shaky breath in. "… died… in childbirth…"

There was silence, before the baby started to cry. Heather went to clean it up and get it fed. Shade brought Shadow inside to calm down. After a while, Shade decided to ask him about how everything happened. "Well… since we had to hide from GUN… we couldn't get to a hospital, so… she died since she couldn't get the treatment and help to survive…" he sobbed. "I feel so bad… it's all my fault that she couldn't go to hospital…"

"Shadow… remember this… it's not your fault that anything like this happens. It's because GUN is corrupted and evil. It's never your fault, or our fault, it's there's." Shade said boldly. "Now, we'll look after you and the baby for as long as you need, even if it's forever." Shade said. "Have you named the baby yet?"

"N-no…b-but… I think we should name her… D-darkness… after her mum…" he said, still sobbing. He wasn't the type of person to hold back his tears, he let it all out, crying almost like a child. Shade just let him do it because he had a very good reason to act like this.

Bless watched all of this happen and despite what Shade said about it all being GUN's fault, all Bless could think about was how it was her dad's fault. She hated him even more for causing this, it was all his fault, she couldn't even begin to imagine what the other's could possibly be going through. She was going to ask Shadow weather he had seen his brothers and sister lately, but he had fallen asleep.

He'd cried himself to sleep. Just like Bless used to do a lot, especially when she was young. And he had something to cry about, he had lost someone he loved so much. It reminded Bless of when she lost her father and mother. But it wasn't time for her to cry, it was time for Shadow to cry. He too, like his elders, had experienced true suffering and the sad thing was, he had a lot more to come, an eternity ahead of him of pain and misery.

Bless watched as he slept, his cheeks wet from the tears. She went over and wiped them from his face, even though he had the face of her father, he had a look of a little last innocence, as if it was just hanging on. This is what told her that it definitely wasn't her father and that it was her nephew so she should treat him with love and care. He also wore different clothes to Shadow. He'd gone with fingerless gloves and black boots.

As she wiped his tears, he stirred a little and turned over to sleep some more. Bless then went to check on how Shade and Heather were doing with the baby. She was expecting them to be cooing at the little baby and giving it love, but instead, only Shade was taking care of it and they were arguing.

"But Shade! I've become the producer of this… black arms spawn! Think of all of the children the rest of our sons and daughters will create! This one's red and black like your dad too!" Heather yelled pointing to baby Darkness. "And think of the children she'll create and so on… and it'll all be put onto me!"

"So… when you think of those future generations that will live on forever, you don't feel proud! What kind of a mother are you?"

"One that feels she's been used just to create an army! These aren't hedgehogs! They're black arms monsters!" she screamed. Bless stayed outside the room to listen in, she was horrified. She had no idea Heather felt this way, but then she remembered the argument they'd have when the younger generation were babies.

She decided to leave them to it, to walk in now would probably cause an even bigger argument. She continued to lean against the door frame, just putting herself out of site, and before she'd made her decision to leave, Heather went bursting out of the room in a rage, only to see Bless eavesdropping on them, only at this time she was lost in her thoughts and decisions.

She snapped out of it to see Heather looked at her in rage. Bless slid against the wall, shuffling herself away from Heather nervously. "How dare you eaves drop on us you little runt! Get out of here!" she yelled, throwing a fist at Bless and hitting her in the face.

"What's going on out there?" Shade shouted out to Heather, when he noticed that she was acting strange outside of the open door. "Who's there?"

Heather didn't answer, but Bless did. "Me…" she said in a timid voice. Shade narrowed his eyes at Heather.

"How dare… you do that… to my… SISTER!" Shade said, putting the baby down on the tale and running out to stand up for Bless.

Now the argument was blazing. Bless got herself away from it too see the baby rolling and wriggling towards the edge of the table. She gasped aloud, giving a little scream before she ran to the baby and caught it before it fell off the edge.

The two of them turned around to see Bless holding the crying baby. Shade ran over to her feeling ashamed for leaving a baby unattended. Heather left their sight. "Thank you so much Bless… she could have been seriously hurt if you hadn't caught her…" Shade said taking the baby back gently. "Are you okay? Did she hit you hard?" he asked worriedly.

"No… she's weak… hardly hurt… shocked me a bit though…" Bless said, acting tough.

"Good… I'll be sure to keep her away from you… and maybe the baby too… she's not happy at all for being related to black arms descendants…" Shade said sadly. He carried on tending to the baby, getting rid of the remainders of it's umbilical cord and cleaning it up completely with warm water in the sink.

Suddenly the both of them heard masculine yell then a large crash. Shade didn't make the same mistake as before by leaving the baby on the table, he took her with him. Shade and Bless ran to see where the noise came from. They went to the room that Shadow had fallen asleep in and saw Heather attacking her own son and Shadow getting ready to attack her back. "What is going on here!" Shade boomed like an authoritive father. The both of them stopped.

"Our own son threw me against that wall!" Heather cried out, tears in her eyes.

"Sh-sh-she…" Shadow started to stutter, utterly shocked by all of this. "She was… s-s-strangling me… while I was… asleep…" he struggled to say. "It was a reflex action…" he gulped, pulling himself away from her and running to Shade for protection.

"Heather… I think you should go… you've been outnumbered." Shade said. "And you're no mother to our children… leave… now!" Shade said, pointing to the door with one hand and holding the baby in the other.

Heather refused to move. Shade handed the baby to Bless and decided to remove her by force. "I said leave now…" he said while gently pushing her towards the exit of the shelter but this made her violent.

"You can't kick me out! This is my home! Get off me! Why don't you leave!" She screamed while hitting Shade as hard as she could. Shade was hit back by this unexpected force.

Shadow saw this, he saw his father being knocked down and this sparked a sudden boost of energy and anger inside of him, it was like his mind went blank.

Bless watched as Shadow charged at his own mother at a great speed, leaping over his fallen father, creating a chaos spear and impaling her in the chest. She coughed, choked and fell to the floor, losing a massive amount of blood before she met her dreadful end.

Young Shadow stood there… still looking angry, breathing heavily until his thoughts returned to his head and he slowly realised what he had done. He fell back onto the floor, curled up into a foetal position and started to whimper to himself. "This isn't happening… .it's just a dream… it's just a dream…" he squeaked.

"It's not…" Shade said solidly, getting off the floor. Then baby Darkness started bawling from Bless' arms. Shadow stayed tightly curled up, not moving from his position, hoping to block out the real world and forget about what he'd done.

Shade went to check on Heather's pulse, there was none. He picked her up looking emotionless, he kicked the door open and carried her out of the building.

Bless was dazed by all of this too. The death of Heather was like the riddance of a wicked old step mother to her. Though she was worried about how Shade would cope.

He didn't return for a few hours. By then the baby was dressed in decent clothes and Shadow was slowly and quietly going mad in the corner of the kitchen where Bless was, hugging his knees, rocking back and forth, wide eyed and breathing heavily. Shade called his name about five times before he got annoyed at his lack of response. "SHADOW!" he yelled, while shaking him.

Shadow looked at his father with wide eyes, not breathing. "Just pull yourself together… it's all over now." Shade said calmly.

"But… I kil-"

"Don't say it! I've dealt with it! It's over… let's just move on." Shade said and left the room. Shadow looked to Bless in confusion.

"You know he's very forgiving… don't be surprised…" Bless said. "Now I think you should hold your baby…" she said, passing it to him and leaving the room.

She went to her room to be alone, only thinking to herself one thing. "He is nothing like my dad." she said to herself as she locked herself in her room all alone to reflect on her thoughts.

**Sorry for the delay on this, I've been quite busy. On a happier note, it's nearly Christmas! (For those of you who are reading shortly after the chapters upload.)**

**Lucy Labrado**


	12. Chapter 12

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 12**

**Sorry for the huge delay. I had some writers block, then it was Christmas followed by more writers block but now I'm writing again!**

So now it was four of them again. Bless, Shade, Shadow and baby Darkness. Bless tended to be left at home alone with Darkness so Shade could go out getting supplies with his son. They were a good team when working together. But Bless hated being left with the baby, because it was like the baby was aware of who she was and hated her.

It was sick over her, pulled her hair, only seemed to mess up it's nappies when she was looking after it and threw food at her. But it only did this when Shade and Shadow were out, Bless swore the baby was smarter than it should have been. But she knew better than to hurt or upset it, or take any kind of revenge on it, that would be heartless and probably make her hated by the others.

One night Shade and Shadow didn't come back as early as they said they would, so Bless had to sleep with the baby, which was a shame since she was tired that day. Sleeping in the same room as a one year old was not easy. It was way past midnight, hours after Bless would usually be asleep and she was still being kept awake by a hyperactive baby. "I shouldn't have let you nap earlier!" Bless said in frustration. "Maybe a warm bottle of milk will help…" she yawned and went to make one.

Even after the bottle, Darkness was still wide awake, although Bless was so tired she fell asleep anyway, only to fall into her horrible nightmares again. "How pathetic… stuck at home with the baby are you? Now you know how I felt…" her father sneered at her, showing his fangs with an evil smirk.

"Yes, and how you made mum feet when you left us!" Bless said, fighting back. Shadow hissed at her and pushed her to the ground.

"It's you who misbehaved and made things harder for her." Shadow sneered. "The same as you did for me… you stupid girl…" he said, grabbing her wrist and pulling her up again, hissing in her face and kicking her in the abdomen. Bless gave out a little scream, then bent over in pain. "Here you are, asleep… in a room where a baby could be doing anything… did you even close it's cot?"

Bless hadn't, the baby could fall out and onto the hard floor. "How do I wake up! Please!" she said urgently.

"You don't…" Shadow said in an evil and chilling tone, wrapping his large fingers around Bless' small neck and closing her airways. Bless decided to try and fight back this time, she couldn't be pulled into unconsciousness again. She kicked Shadow between the legs and he broke away from her, holding himself where he'd been kicked, very tightly. "You brat!" Shadow cried out, falling to his knees.

Bless smirked, now she was on top, finally able to enjoy her dreams, but that's when it all started to disappear. She had now woken up. He gasped, jolting upright. "Darkness!" She yelped, looking over to the cot frantically, it was open and Darkness was gone, "Darkness!" she called, she got up and ran out of the room, only to be stopped by her nephew Shadow, who was holding Darkness in his arms.

"Thanks for looking after her again Bless, we'll try and be home early next time." he said smiling and walked off with the baby in his arms.

Bless was confused, she had done a good job after all and she could sleep in peace, a part from the demon father in her dreams trouble of course. But she was getting better at fighting him off now, so maybe she wouldn't suffer as much. Suddenly the world around her started to warp and she started to feel dizzy, her surroundings turned into the ones she would see in her dreams, just darkness.

She had no idea of what was happening. "Does this mean… what I just saw never happened and that Darkness isn't okay?" she screamed in a panic. She looked over to Shadow who had his eyes narrowed at her in hatred.

"Yes, and I think you deserved it too…" he said. "Now, you should wake up for real or the baby could be hurt…" he teased again. Bless screamed at the malevolent Shadow as he charged at her and shot a chaos spear at her head, but before it hit her she woke up with a jolt.

Now sitting upright, she was awake for good, at least she hoped she was. She looked over to the cot, Darkness wasn't there again. She ran out of the room hoping to see her nephew again with Darkness but he was no where to be seen. She looked down the hallway to the exit, the door was open by ajar. She heard the scream of a baby, Darkness had escaped.

She ran down the hall and flung the door open to see that Darkness was in the hands of a GUN soldier. Bless lost her breath and strength in her legs and fell to her knees in fear. She tried to get back into the shelter and shut the door but the soldier grabbed her by the arm while holding the baby in the other. "I've got two black arms hedgehogs right here!" he called over to his right, then a couple of other soldiers ran over with their guns out, ready to shoot.

Bless screamed out as loud and she could but Shade and Shadow didn't come running home like she hoped they would. "I think it's a mother and her kid…" said one of the newcomers, taking the baby.

"She's my great nice you idiot!" Bless snapped.

"Oh… so there is more of you… a lot more by the sound of it…" the leading soldier who had a hold of her arm said. He got out a pair of handcuffs from his belt and put Bless into them as she struggled as hard as she could. She felt like such an idiot, it was her fault that she had blown their cover and there was no doubt the soldiers would be after Shadow and Shade too.

She tried her best to get out of their grasp and back into the shelter but they dragged her away from the door and to their vehicle. "You stay here and look out for any other black arms hedgehogs." the leading soldier said to one of the other soldiers. He did as he was asked and stayed while Bless and Darkness were driven away with the other GUN soldiers.

For hours and hours they were riding in the open vehicle, Bless was holding baby Darkness and worrying about the others. She also had her legs crossed, wishing she could have used the toilet before they had left, the bumpy ride not making it any easier for her to wait.

The vehicle stopped outside of a tall thick building with high security and GUN logos on various walls and pieces of equipment. With the baby back in GUN's hands and Bless' hands stuck behind her back in the cuffs, they slowly walked into the building.

After yet another hour of going through security and getting teased and mocked she finally reached her cell, where she saw Shade and Shadow sulking inside it. Her eyes widened, their lateness made a lot of sense now. "We're so sorry Bless… we gave in and told them where you were…" Shade said sounding ashamed as Bless was shoved into the cell and the baby gently thrown over to Shadow.

"Why did you give in?" Bless said, worried that they may have been tortured for answers. They were both silent, avoiding eye contact with her. Bless began to cry silently, they had been captured and it was all over.

"He he, so this is why we were sent south… HQ _knew _you were there… I guess I should call back our last troop, this all of you right?" said the soldier who had lead them to their doom, he started to walk away. Bless ran to the bars and called him back.

"Come back! You can't just leave me here!" she cried out to him.

"_Why_?" he said arrogantly turning back to her.

"I need to use the toilet… please…" She pleaded. The soldier shook his head, smirking. "Please… I'll only be two minutes… it's urgent!" she said in frustration, giving the bars and angry shake.

"No way… you're not leaving the cell… why would I let you out? It's against my orders… you can ask The Commander when he comes to see our new catch…" he teased and left.

"Oh…" Bless groaned, sitting down in between her nephew and brother. "How long do you think he'll be?" she asked them anxiously.

"Well… we've been here for about half a day now… so he could be a while, if he hasn't come in that long time, then why would he come n-"

"Well well, well… look at who it is…" they heard the voice of The Commander and looked up to see him. "It's been a long time since I saw you two…" he said, referring to Shade and Bless. He looked a lot older now, no longer a young and new Commander. Shade charged at the bars aggressively,

"You're going to pay for what you've done to us you creep!" he roared at him, kicking at the bars like a ferocious dog. He stopped as The Commander had got his gun out and was pointing it at Shade.

"Stop that or I'll shoot… that's not the kind of behaviour for a grown man like you…" he said, Shade stepped back and sat down again, a livid look still on his face. He wanted to kill this man for what he had done to them. This Commander was responsible for their mother's death.

"You're all going to stay here for the rest of your lives… I can't risk you spawning and reproducing… just the one of you was enough… but Shadow just had to forget his protection in bed… idiot…"

"D-do you have to talk about him like that?" Bless said, a horrible image appearing in her head. An image no person wants to have of their parents. But her mind was taken off that as she was reminded of her need. "Commander… please… can you just let me use the toilet… please?" she begged him.

"Well, that was all of a sudden, wasn't it?" The Commander said.

"No, she's been complaining about that a while now…" Shade said. "Well, are you going to let her go or what?"

"No, but I will be separating you all, once we get to prison island." The Commander said sinisterly.

"Oh no… please…" Bless continued to plead.

"Just let her go! How hard can it be!" Shade said in a threatening tone.

"When your in your cell on Prison Island, you'll be able to go." The Commander teased and walked away from the cell, out of sight. Bless' eyes widened, she couldn't wait that long, she had to try something. "But it's that time of the month!" she yelled all of a sudden. Shadow and Shade both leapt out of their seats away from her and Bless blushed. The Commander stepped back a few times to get back to the cell, he was speechless. With a shaky hand he unlocked the cell and led her down the hallway.

About ten minutes later Shade and Shadow heard Bless and The Commanders footsteps, they were making their way back to the cell. Bless was looking relived and smug while The Commander looked traumatised. "Never say anything like that… again…" he said, opened the cell, pushed her and locked it again. "We'll be leaving soon." he said and left.

"It's not really your time-" Shadow asked timidly, Bless narrowed her eyes at him so he would stop, she shook her head. "I wish something like that would work for us…" Shadow said nervously.

"Sadly there's not pity for us men…" Shade sighed while Bless was still looking smug, she now had a new trick.


	13. Chapter 13

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 13**

**If you haven't already I think you should check out my other story that I'm in progress with at the moment too: 'It Isn't The End: Second Chance'. **

As it was said, the four of them were taken out of the cell, they were about to be transported to Prison Island. They walked through many corridors and halls, and as they were doing so, Bless and Shadow stopped in their tracks and Darkness started crying. Shade had carried on walking with the soldiers, he soon noticed that they had stopped. "What are you all doing?" he called back to them, the soldiers also noticed their absence and looked back.

"Follow us now, or we'll shoot!" said one of the soldiers. The two of them had a look of uneasiness and discomfort on their face while Darkness continued to cry, going against their anxiety, they did as they were told. When they had left the room and travelled a short distance, the feeling went.

"What was that?" Shade asked them. The two of them shrugged, looking worried and confused.

"We just sensed this… strange energy… it didn't tell us to stop or control us or anything it was just so… strange and kind of painful… in a way… it stopped us completely…" Shadow said.

None of them had any idea of what it was and what had caused it, but they were leaving the building now, ready to get into a jet, helicopter or other vehicle to take them over seas to prison island. What they didn't know was that, as they had felt the need to stop and the strange energy, they were walking over the very space _The _Shadow The Hedgehog was being held, several floors below, in his cold storage chamber, not to be released for roughly another 165 years.

Bless was expecting the journey to take a long time, although despite travelling hundreds of miles they were there within half an hour. GUN certainly had fast vehicles, they had flown there in a s jet plane so it wasn't that surprising.

"Here we are… you new, permanent home… this is going to be fun…" The Commander said as they were being pushed out of the landed jet, in thick cuffs around their wrists so that they wouldn't try to run away.

They were brought down several floors underground, this made Bless feel very uneasy, she could hear the ocean water above them, they were underwater! However, if the place had lasted this long, through over a century of existing and the fames of disaster, then it wouldn't collapse on them.

Bless felt lost already, it would take hours of searching to get out of this place, and this was without masses of soldiers chasing her, she could see that this was the end. They came across a corridor of small cells, rows of them on both sides of the corridor, but the opposite cells weren't Parallel to each other, it was more like layers of bricks, the middle of one cell was parallel with the edges of two other cells opposite it. They were lucky enough to be put into the cells surrounding each other.

Their cuffs were taken off, one by one and they were shoved into their cells. In one cell, Bless on her own, on the opposite side Shadow and Darkness in one cell and Shade in the other, it was like a triangle formation, but Shadow and Shadow couldn't see each other.

Inside each of the cells there was one bed, a sink and a toilet. The toilet was not in a separate room though, and Bless did not like the fact that she was in full view of both boys. The three of them were alone, in their cells, stuck behind thick bars which were to close together to fit through or break.

At least not for Darkness. Shadow realised this as she crawled across the floor and over to the bars. "Darkness, no, don't go out there!" Shadow exclaimed in shock, getting up from his bed and running to her but she was already through. "Bless, she's gone to your side, reach her!" he said urgently.

Bless ran over to the bars, got hold of Darkness and gently pulled her through before she could crawl away. Luckily the corridor between them was thin enough, so as both young Shadow and Bless reached out their arms through the bars, Bless was able to pass Darkness to her nephew.

Darkness began to kick up a fuss, screaming and kicking and Shadow's arms, wanting to get out of the cell. "Look, I want to get out too… but we're stuck here." Shadow said to her, wishing she could understand. "Bless… when was the last time you fed her?"

"A few hours before our capture. I wouldn't have even done it then if she wasn't restless in the night." Bless said.

"She's fine then… but still, for her sake I hope we're brought some food." Shadow said, looking into his baby daughter's sad eyes. Seeing this, he began to cry himself, falling to his knees with the baby in his arms, sobbing his eyes out. "Why us… what have we done to deserve this? Is this because I killed mum? Is this all my fault? I'm a monster!" he cried out, not holding back his tears.

"Shadow, it's not your fault! This was going on even before you were born, I don't even think they know what you did… they wouldn't care! Calm down, we'll think of a way out!" he heard Shade call from his cell.

"You will not!" They heard the Commander say in triumph as he came into their view. Shade's blood started to boil,

"You're so smug while we're behind bars! But when we get out you'll regret everything you've ever done to me and my family! We'll fight it out! Man to man!" Shade roared, kicking at the bars.

"Oh really? And _when _will this be? Not during my life time, that's for sure!" The Commander teased. Shade continued to hit at the bars in anger but fell back, clutching his stomach as he felt weak. "Hungry are you… too bad because none of you will be getting any food, enjoy your eternity of pain!" he said with an short evil laugh.

"I'm not even immortal you know! Remember!" Shade said

"Wow… I completely forgot about that… so, last of your family to be mortal… I could kill you here and now so that it's only these freaks left!" The Commander said, getting his gun out of his back pocket. Shade stepped backwards and pressed himself against the back of his cell.

"Please don't kill me… I have family who need me…" Shade pleaded.

"They don't need you! Look at them! They're immortal black arms spawn with superpowers! Having a regular Mobian on their side probably slows them down! They won't miss you when you're gone!"

"No! Don't kill him Please!" Bless screamed out desperately. "He's my brother! I need him!"

"What do you think we are? Savages! He's family to us, not a worthless ally!" Shadow said in hatred, feeling his mind going blank again. He reached out of the cell and grabbed The Commander's leg. He pulled it so he would trip over. The corridor was so thin, he tripped, his legs against Shadow's side and his face banging into Bless' side. Bless conjured the strength and courage to kick him in the face while Shadow pulled on his legs to get him upright, it was a struggle since he was stuck behind bars.

Shadow had a firm grip on The Commander's arm "Say goodbye!" he hissed and started yanking his arm. The Commander was smashed against the hard metal bars many times. Gaining bigger and bigger bruises each time, his skull was cracked and after about 30 seconds of pain, it was all over.

Shadow stood looking down on the dead body, breathing heavily still in pure anger until his thoughts returned to his head. He then stepped back in shock, as if he was shocked with what he had done as if he had come to his senses and realised everything he'd just done. He began to whimper like he did when had when he'd killed his mother, he then curled up in a foetal position.

"Shadow… do you realise the irony of that sentence you just said." Shade said breathlessly. "You killed him!"

"I'm so sorry…" he said, rocking on the floor, as if he was going mad. His baby daughter curling up beside him and rocking too, playfully mimicking his movements having no idea of what just happened.

"I wanted to kill him!" Shade said in anger. "Boy, when I get in there-"

"Shade… that's a stupid excuse to punish him…" Bless said, stepping in to defend her nephew.

Suddenly they heard heavy and fast footsteps and the door at the far end of the corridor open. "Commander! You're needed!" an armed soldier said running towards him, stopping in his tracks when he noticed he was on the floor bleeding from many places. "Wha- what have you done to him!" he yelled, pointing his gun at Shadow, who the dead body was nearest to.

"I didn't do anything!" Shadow's muffled voice came from the curled up body in the middle of the cell.

"Well why are you doing that then!" The Soldier said, his voice breaking in fear. There was no answer from him. "Answer me or I'll shoot!" he said, reluctantly aiming his long gun at him, ready to shoot. Shadow just whimpered from his curled up position. Shade saw him get ready to shoot.

"Don't you dare hurt him! He's innocent… I did it… he's just traumatised…" Shade said, taking the blame for his son. "He had it coming… he killed my mother… all he wants to do is torment us… I just wanted our pain to end." he said sounding nervous. "Please… just let my family go… and take me."

"I can't do that, we need permission from the highest authority to do that and you killed him!" The Soldier said, now pointing the gun over to Shade. "What I do know is that you Black Arms hedgehogs no longer have any rights and that the penalty for murder is to be shot… but since your immortal I guess you won't mind it." he said ignorantly. Shade's eyes widened, he opened his mouth ready to scream but no sound ever came out, the soldier was to quick to shoot.

The many bullets blasted through his torso and neck, the blood splattering across the wall behind him.

"Sh-shade… no… SHADE!" Bless screamed out. "How could you… NO!"

Shadow could hear the blood of his father splatter in the cell next to him and his eyes widened, he had been killed. By the look of horror on Bless' face he knew the worst had happened. Once again his mind went blank, his fur bristled and his was ready to explode. "Y-you bastard… you just killed my only parent… you're going to pay for this… _immediately_!" Shadow roared. A large blast of red chaos energy was expelled from his body, it wasn't as big as a chaos blast but it was powerful enough to destroy the soldier completely. Though it hadn't hurt Bless of his baby.

"Oh no … I've done it again… I am a monster… j-just… kill me now…" Shadow said, breaking down physically. "I only bring bad to the world!" he cried out.

"They deserved it… you're alright… now can you get us out of here?" Bless said urgently, hot tears streaming down her cheeks. Shadow looked clueless. "Well if you can do chaos blast then surely you can do chaos control!" she said feeling the tension build up inside her.

"Chaos… what now? I have no idea what I just did!" he exclaimed. "Oh… my head…" he said slowly and shakily, slowly falling back onto his bed.

"SHADOW!" Bless cried out in desperation. Shadow had passed out, the bottom half of his body hanging off of the bed. "Wake up!" she screamed.

Then many soldiers flooded into the room. Bless braced herself for what was about to come.

**Let us all review in memory of Shade. Shade: You can't gain from my tragic death! *Angry Face***

**I think I can… **

**Lucy Labrador**


	14. Chapter 14

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 14**

The Soldiers all stormed into the room, Bless was literally all alone, with Shadow unconscious and Darkness completely useless and Shade… -

She pressed herself up against the back of the cell in fear, she didn't want them to hurt her. "You monsters! Look at what you've done!" the soldier in the front yelled. "Who killed them?" he said, turning to Bless, the only one conscious.

Bless thought about what she would say before she said it, if she said Shade had killed them, then Shadow would be saved, Shade was gone now anyway. But it would be wrong to lie about him in that way, she wanted to honour her brother, not make him look bad. Bless stayed silent, fear in her eyes. "Tell us or we'll shoot!" The soldier said aggressively, pointing the gun at her.

Bless screamed out in terror. "Please… don't hurt me!" She cried out. "I haven't done anything!" she pleaded.

"Bless?" they all hear Shadow's faint voice, waking up from his unconsciousness. "I know what dad said… but… is this all my fault? I killed them Bless… the same as I killed my own mother… it's not you they should be after… they shouldn't have killed dad… they should be after me…" he rasped, not realising he had made a full confession.

"Is that true!" Said the soldier, he turned around to point the gun at Shadow. Shadow was shocked for a second but then nodded with determination. "Well, you know what'll happen to you." he said. Shadow shut his eyes tight, bracing himself for the pain that was to follow. There was a small explosion like sound and Shadow was hit in the chest and stomach by many large bullets. Green blood splattered over the walls and floor, and he fell to the ground. Struggling to breathe and his torso open, showing his battered insides. His eyes were wide and he was struggling through the pain.

Bless screamed out bloody murder, it looked worse than Shade's condition. He was still awake, conscious, breathing, in agony. "SHADOW! Oh my- look at him… how could you do that to him… you're literally torturing him!" she screamed out.

Darkness let out a large scream too, she was bawling, all of this noise and seeing her only parent's guts sprawled out on the floor was not a pretty sight, even for a baby who shouldn't understand. **(I hope this isn't too gruesome. Just remember, their blood is green if it makes the visuals any less severe.) **"Darkness… please… it's okay… daddy is okay… I won't die…" Shadow rasped, tears falling from his eyes. "What are you going to do…" he let out a grunt of pain in the middle of his sentence. "… to my baby now? Please… give her to Bless. She can look after her…" he pleaded weakly.

"No, she's coming with us and 'Bless' is going somewhere special." the leader said sinisterly.

"W-why me… I haven't done anything…" Bless sobbed.

"Don't play games… you're obviously the leader, the strong female of the group, the mother of the tribe."

"The… what! I am not! Shade was my older brother! He was the leader until…" She let out a sob of despair. "Until you killed him!"

"So… how are you related to this two here?" He asked confidently, pointing to Shadow and Darkness.

"Shadow is my… nephew… and Darkness is my great niece…" he said nervously.

"So… now you're the eldest of all of them, so you are, in a way the leader… the infant will stay in special care until she's old enough. The male adult here will stay in here to recover…" he turned to Bless. "While you…" he said darkly. "Will come with us…"

"Where?" Bless shook, her eyes wide. The leader of the group opened the cell, put her in handcuffs and led her out of the room. "No! Please, I swear! I'm nothing, I can't defend for myself! I'm not the leader! Please, leave me alone!" she cried out desperately as she was dragged out of the room. Despite hearing the distraught cries of a young woman, none of the men seemed shaken or upset about it in any way. Shadow lay in agony, trying his hardest to gain his strength back. He wanted to help his aunt so much, but it was no use.

While he was immobilised the cell was opened and his baby taken away, kicking and screaming, looking back at Shadow with sad eyes, she didn't want to be taken away from her father. Shadow, feeling all alone, the lowest he could get, saw the dead bodies of the humans taken away respectfully. He then saw the surviving soldiers go into his fathers cell, drag him out, blood trails being left on the floor behind him. Shadow's eyes filled with tears, seeing the dead body of his father was bad enough, and he saw it being treated as if it were the body of a dead rat.

He was left all alone in the cell, unable to move, only able to cry to himself, his family was gone, this had turned out worse than it was supposed to and the only thing going through his mind was that it was his fault.

Bless was taken to another part of this underground area of Prison Island, put into another small cell of her own. It had shackles dangling from the ceiling and some attached to the floor. Bless didn't like the look of this, she tensed up in fear. They took her inside, lifting her up to the shackles above, clipping her wrists into them, so she was dangling from above. "This isn't comfortable at all… please… this isn't necessary… I'm not going to hurt anyone…" she trembled as she hung from the ceiling.

Next the soldiers took the shackles from the floor and clipped them over her ankles, it made no difference, it only put a little more weight onto her body, so they went down and shortened them, so it gave a little tug on her body, now she wouldn't be able to swing and hurt anyone, she was stuck solid, her body slightly stretched from the tension. "Oww… please… that hurts… this isn't how you should treat a girl…" she trembled, her eyes tight in pain and fear. The soldiers left her inside, locking the barred door and leaving her there.

Darkness was put into special care with a nurse which looked after her, the other two wouldn't be getting any food but the baby did. GUN did this in hope that the baby would grow old thinking that it's parents or creators were humans and that she would work for them.

It didn't work.

Shadow's body took a long time to recover without food or chaos energy, but once it did, his digestive system shut down, seeing that there would be no food. He stayed in his cell, mindlessly living on, all thought gone from his head, this new life was too much for him to cope.

Bless' body did the same too, no longer feeling hungry or thirsty, watching her unchanging surroundings in the day and being tormented by her dreams in the night. The pain seemed never ending, she wished that her body would just give out and it would all end.

Meanwhile, out in the freedom of a burning but more peaceful countryside, Shade's children spawned. All eight of them found wives and husbands of their own and unlike their brother Shadow, and more like their parents, had multiple births themselves. None of them had non-uplets, however all had either, triplets or quadruplets. The number of Black Arms hedgehogs were rising, quickly since they were all, of course, Black Arms hedgehogs.

There was nearly 30 of the new generation, and that was in just one generation! They grew up fast also, not caring about education and jobs, just growing up and having children. They wouldn't be able to get education anyway. It was as if they were living as their own clan or heard with one thing on their mind, reproduce as many children as possible. Their parents knew the reason they had to hide and told them, so hoped to have many children just as their parents did. Darkness' cousins were on a mission to increase the size of their colony, in order to annoy GUN even further.

Darkness had fully grown just like the others, all on her own, with only humans surrounding her. But she knew, she knew that they weren't her rightful parents or creators and that Shadow was her father. GUN's plan had gone wrong, they would soon regret the many years of training they had given her.

Bless, still on her own, hanging from the ceiling, the pain numbed from the years of anguish, heard a large crash in the distance, it was coming from the area she sensed Darkness was. She started to feel worried for her, it was either Darkness who had caused the blast for her own personal gain or GUN was up to something.

Then she saw a red and black blur charging through the corridor, it skidded and stopped a few meters past Bless' cell. Then walked back that distance and saw Bless. Bless' eyes widened, it was definitely Darkness. She was now fully grown, had red and black fur, red eyes like all black arms hedgehogs. She had long hair that reached her shoulders.

Even though Bless was expecting Darkness to be happy to see Bless and try to help her, start to cry after seeing real family for once or something along those lines, nothing like that happened. Darkness gave out a confident laugh, looked up at Bless in a way that made it feel as if she was looking down on her. "I hoped I would see you again… the humans said they had something special planned for you… they weren't lying!" she said in an amused tone.

"But… you were a baby! How would you know that!" Bless exclaimed. There was no answer. "Oh… never mind… just set me free… please." she begged. Darkness just shrugged and started to walk away. "Where are you going!" Bless screamed in fear that she would be left there.

"There is someone a lot more important to me that needs saving." Darkness called back as she continued to run.

"You brat! Get back here! You found me first! GET HERE NOW!" Bless screamed in rage, but Darkness never returned. "Oh… now that she's old enough to be punished, when I get my hands on her she's dead meat!" Bless growled to herself. She wanted to be saved so much but it seemed as if her nephew would get the first taste of freedom and possibly the only.

Shadow was asleep in his cell, something he did a lot to pass the time, a lack of chaos energy meant he was tired most of the time and sleep didn't make it better. Despite his love of sleep, he awakened with a start as the bars of his cell were being torn apart noisily. He looked around in shock for the source of the awful noise. His shocked look turned to a happy one, he recognised his daughter immediately , getting up and holding her tight in a hug. "Darkness!" Shadow cried out hugging her tightly. "How did you do that."

"Those pathetic humans have been training me, they hoped I would fight for them… their decade and a half of training is going to backfire on them now." she said boldly. "I've been waiting all of this time to see you dad… I love you…" she said softly, helping him out. As she was leading him out, tugging on his wrist to get him to follow she noticed he was weak, and transferred some of her Chaos energy over to him with her touch.

Shadow breathed in heavily in surprise. "Wow, I feel so alive again, did you do that?" he asked her and got a nod in return. "Great, now let's find Bless, have you seen her yet?"

"No." Darkness lied. "Let's go through here, I haven't been through here yet, it must be where she's being kept." she said, pointing to the corridor she already came through. The two of them stopped when they found Bless' cell. Without warning Darkness sent Chaos spears at the chains that were holding Bless and she came crashing to the floor. Bless stayed on the floor, she hadn't moved in 15 years, it was a struggle for her now. "Get a move on, we haven't got much time!" Darkness said urgently. Bless stayed down for a while, trying to push herself up with her hands and legs but she was too weak.

Darkness broke the bars of the cell, ran inside, gave her energy through her touch and yanked her up by her arm. "Come on!" she growled, Bless narrowed her eyes at Darkness until she found herself being yanked towards the exit.

Then they were met with a security door. Darkness tried her Chaos spear again, it didn't work, it made a mere scratch. "What!" Darkness exclaimed, looking not so confident now.

The Commander came up behind them. "Why are you so surprised… why would be teach you a trick you could use to escape… we had fifteen years to plan for this." he said triumphantly.

"Wow… you've gotten old." Shadow teased.

"Shut up! My son will be taking over soon! It's just the retiring age these days is very high! Times are still tough… now enough of this. Darkness, if you don't obey us you will be destroyed!"

"No way!" Darkness said, creating another chaos spear and pointing it at The Commander.

"We've taught you so many attacks, why are you only using this one!" The Commander said like an angry teacher.

"How are you doing it? I've been trying to do that since I was young. Dad used to do it all of the time." Bless said.

"She learned from your dad…" The Commander said darkly. Bless began to feel panicky, had they gotten the long lost Shadow to join her their side! "I can see that you're confused. You see… we found some old surveillance footage of him using his unique chaos attacks, all Darkness had to do was watch, copy his movements and work out how to use her chaos energy."

"Can you teach me!" Bless asked Darkness hopefully.

"Fat chance!" Darkness said. "Now, leave me alone so I can kill this creep!" she said, pushing Bless back and running towards The Commander with her spear at the ready. Seeing the angry, charging hedgehog The Commander, within a split second, got out his gun, aimed it at Darkness and pulled the trigger.

**It's been a while since the last chapter but I was finally able to finish it. Happy New Year.**

**Lucy Labrador**


	15. Chapter 15

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 15**

**Did anyone notice the awful continuity error in the last chapter?**

Darkness saw this hasty attack coming, launched her chaos spear, and ducked down just in case. The chaos spear went through the bullet, splitting it in two, the shrapnel flying into the walls, the spear kept going though, hitting The Commander in the stomach. Darkness stood tall and confident as The Commander fell to the floor, clutching his new wound. "Guess you won't be retiring after all!" she teased. He's stopped moving, he was dead.

"Hey… is it only me who's getting déjà vu?" Shadow said. Darkness turned to him in confusion. "I thought _I _had killed him!" he said.

"I guess he wasn't dead after all…" Bless said, sounding confused. "Either that or there's been a little continuity error on the part of the author!"

"Well, no turning back now… I had fun killing him." Darkness said arrogantly. "Now, enough breaking the fourth wall, we have to concentrate on breaking this security door!" she said.

"Well, if you teach us how to use Chaos Spear, then we can all try." Bless said, hoping it would work and she would be taught.

"No way!" Darkness said with a smirk.

"Shadow! Tell your daughter to have a little respect… please…" Bless said with gritted teeth.

"Darkness… just teach us so we can escape." Shadow sighed.

"No… it took me years to master it, and we don't have years, the guards will be here very soon!" Darkness said. "I might as well try and do it myself… perhaps there's a weak spot somewhere on here…"

But it was too late, Soldier and Guards game flooding into the corridor they were in, all guns pointed at them. "No please, we were so close…" Bless said, getting tears in her eyes.

"Close? You were no where near close! You have loads of floors to go! You'll never escape from here!" said one of them. "Now which one of you did this to him!" he said, pointing at The Commander.

"We're not telling you anything." Shadow growled.

"I did." Darkness said confidently. "So go ahead and shoot me… _if you dare…_" she said, getting a chaos spear ready. The ignorant soldier tried his luck and shot at her, giving him the same fate as The Commander. "Anyone else want to have a turn?" he said, smirking. "Or are you going to let us go?"

Unexpectedly, all soldiers shot at her simultaneously, but Darkness was ready, she created a chaos blast that deflected all of their bullets and killed the many soldiers in the process. "Darkness… over kill much?" Shadow said in shock.

"It was for the sake of our well being, now let's… g-go… oh… I'm dizzy… I should have know this would… happen." she said and fell limp, Shadow was able to catch her.

"That's exactly what happened to me.." he said. "Do you know why it happens?" he said to Bless.

"You need special rings… my dad had them… whenever he used attacks he wouldn't get tired because of the rings, and if he rings had to come off then he would get tired, like you and Darkness did. But I have no idea what they were, how they worked, what they were made out of or anything…" she said. "It's useless… we should just give up now… we're going to be prisoners forever…" she sighed sadly.

"No we're not, we have to escape! Even though it won't be this time around…" Shadow said.

"Says you who gets to stay in a comfortable cell while I'm in these awful shackles being dangled from the ceiling." Bless said sounding irritated. Then they turned around to look at the door and gasped. "She broke it! Why didn't we notice this! Let's go!" Bless said. Shadow picked Darkness' whole body up and they began to run.

Then they were stopped by another group of soldiers, that was lead by a young looking man wearing a similar uniform to the now dead Commander. "That must be his son… oh dear." Bless whispered Shadow once they were stationary.

"Where's my dad… I need him to help me take you to your new prison" he said confidently. Bless looked at him nervously.

"Umm… we have some… bad news…" she said slowly and unsurely, regretting she'd ever said anything, they were in for it now.

"No way…. You monsters… what have you done to him!" he said, getting out his own gun, this one was different to the others that had been used, a lot more high tech. "I guess I'll have to take you to the new concentration camps myself." he sneered.

"Concentration… camp!" Bless cried out. "Isn't this going too far!" she trembled.

"Hey… you don't seem too upset about the death of your father…" Shadow said in confusion. "Something's going on…" he growled.

"Don't you see, now that he's gone, I'm in power!" he sniggered. "The whole military is mine!" he said triumphantly. "Soldiers, take them to our transport!" he ordered them. The three of them were seized by the soldiers and roughly taken to a room full of vehicles.

"It's a long time since we did this." Shadow said. "This time, we'll break free of the guards and jump out of the plane." he whispered to Bless with determination.

"I heard that… and we're not going over in a plane, we're going in a submarine… we'll be underground as soon as we get there… we're not risking anything." The brand new Commander said so. This one looked a little less like the original Commander, Abraham Towers but still bared resemblance to him.

They were put into the submarine in hand cuffs as always and separated, made to stay silent until the end of the journey. It took a brief journey of thirty minutes to get to their new destination and they were travelling hundreds of miles. By then Darkness had woken up and only the thought of being underwater stopped her from chaos blasting the submarine open.

They got out of the sub and onto land, which was underwater, underground and a long way from freedom. They were being led to their cells and Shadow had a thought. "Hey… I have just one request before we go down… I want to know what year it is…" he said to The Commander.

"It's 3285." he said plainly. They came to the corridors full of cells and to their surprise some of them already had some black arms hedgehogs in them! Shadow broke free and ran to one of the cells in surprise.

"Maria, Tiffany, Heather, Eclipse." he said in a hurry, his four sisters were in one cell. He looked at the cell opposite. "David, Shade, Dusk, Scarlet! They have all of you! How long have you been here!" he said frantically, he was grabbed and pulled away from the cells. Shadow was shocked to see that they had all of his siblings.

"Only a few hours… they have some of our children too… however most of them were able to escape when they found our home… you have to escape too…this place is crazy!" David said,

"We knew your kind was out there multiplying somewhere, so we built this place… you're never going to escape from it… think of it like Prison Island, only ten times harder!" The Commander said, the three of them trembled in fear, they were all shoved into a nearby cell. They were glad they were altogether now and in view of Shadow's brothers.

"Darkness… you know you can do chaos spear and blast… how about chaos control?" Shadow asked her. "I don't think I can take any more of this… you only have to take me and Bless… we can try and get the others… once you teach us how to fight… please…" Shadow pleaded very quietly.

"You shouldn't be begging your own daughter… you're going to do as he says right?" Bless said, not sounding as stern as she wanted to but also worried and desperate like Shadow.

"Hmm… I'll definitely take dad with me but… I'm not sure about her…" Darkness said sinisterly.

"You are not leaving her behind, now let's go." Shadow said. Darkness held onto the two of them and asked,

"Where to?"

"Our old home, if you know where that is…" Shadow said. Darkness nodded, there was a flash after the well know saying was said and they were all at home once more. However all that was left was a pile of rubble within a hole in the ground. "It's… gone..." Shadow said, bending down and picking up one of his old toys that was half trapped under the rubble. "This is definitely it…" he said, looking at the gritty old baby toy. "Damn it… there's nothing left… our home is gone… what are we going to do now?" Shadow said, struggling to hold back the tears.

"We need to travel… but I know how… me and Shade used to do it. Our home is the road." Bless said. "And Darkness can train us as we travel in search of a new home."

"What! Aww… I'm so used to staying in one place, this is going to be hard." Shadow complained.

"It'll be easy." Darkness said.

"For you… you've been trained all of your life!" Shadow exclaimed. "And you… have done this before!" he said to Bless.

"It was a long time ago… you'll get used to it, I promise." Bless said. "I think that we should try and find what we can from the remainder of our home…" she said and started picking up pieces of old wall and rubble in hope that she would find something there. The other two began to do the same. Bless took a step over a piece of concrete, it broke under her foot, she tripped and there was a large explosion.

The three of them were thrown meters alone with the debris and house remains, Bless landed, her side gashed open and he skull cracked as he head impacted the ground. Shadow landed a long way from Bless, it seemed fine for him until a large piece of rock landed on his bottom half, trapping and crushing both of his legs. Darkness managed to land on her feet, and dodge two oncoming pieces of rubble.

She turned around to see that her father and great aunt in a horrible mess. Naturally she ran to her dad first, "Dad! Are you okay! Please!" she cried out running over to him. She lifted the rock off of him, his legs crushed and broken. She propped him up against the rock so that he was sitting upright, she tried to wake him up. "Please dad!" she screamed.

"He's going to be fine you know…" Bless said, from the floor a few feet away. "We're all immortal remember… now… once you're done shouting at him, do you think you can help me? Here I am… in pain, while he's unconscious… he's not feeling any pain… did you think of that?"

"But… I don't care about you as much." Darkness said callously.

"At least your honest…" Bless said sarcastically in anger. She tried to get herself to sit up, but her side was bleeding and it hurt more than she could take. She gave out a scream of pain, but no one came to help her.

"Oww! Why the hell was there a bomb there! GUN have gone too far!" Bless cried out. "Darkness… please!" she cried out, begging for help.

"How pathetic are you! You're supposed to be the responsible adult here! I'm the kid here, not you! You come and help me! You can't put yourself before your own nephew!" Darkness yelled in anger, not even thinking about going the help her.

"I'm not putting myself before him! We're all going to turn out fine here, but I'm the one suffering the most at the moment aren't I! If Shadow was awake and screaming like I was I'd be with you on helping him, but he's not, so help me now!" Bless demanded.

"Shut up you bitch… I'm staying here with my dad until he's okay, no matter how hurt you are! Just put up with it!" Darkness yelled and sat down by her unconscious dad.

Bless began to bawl out in pain, it hurt too much, she was being treated like trash, she wanted it to end. She began to feel dizzy from the blood loss and cracked skull, she passed out.

**I've put some more pictures for this story on Deviant ART. Go to y profile and find the link. **

**Lucy Labrador**


	16. Chapter 16

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 16**

**Remember to look on my profile for links to pictures for this story. **

Bless was now stuck in the dream world again and after all of these years she was still being haunted by her dad. "Oh dear… what's happened now? Been betrayed by your own family member have you?" Her father, Shadow said in his sinister voice, "No surprise there really… with Shade gone I think you'll be kicked out of the group… they don't need you…" he hissed.

"But they do… I'm the oldest of them both, they need a leader." Bless said confidently.

"But, you're useless… you can't fight, even my grandson, Shadow is better than you and he hasn't even been taught how to fight… you're useless and they will get rid of you. I can assure you of it."

"I've had it with you! Just leave me alone!" Bless said, she didn't like what he was saying. Most of the things he predicted turned out to be true, for example, he said she would get caught, and she did. She was nervous, not knowing weather to believe it to be true or not. "How do you know… I-if you're just a figure of my imagination… how do you know what's going to happen?"

"I'm not a figure of your imagination… I'm real… you know I am… and until you're saved by Darkness, you're stuck here with me." he said evilly, walking over to her confidently.

"How many times have you said something like that now… you always say things that are meant to scare me and yet, you don't anymore. So what I'm staying with you! I can kick your ass!" Bless said, getting ready for any attacks he would use. Bless could see that Shadow was not liking her new found confidence. "Come and get me if you dare!" she teased. Shadow charged at her, dodged one of her kicks, swiftly got behind her and grabbed a hold of her so she was still.

"I think that you were a bit over confident there…" Shadow mocked, saying it right in her ear. He kicked her back and she was launched into the unseen wall of darkness. "So, you thought you could defeat me… you were wrong, and I hope that you can see that now that I've given you a taster of my strength."

Bless was getting up, holding her side in pain and groaning. "It seems a little bit of reality has leaked in… your wound is starting to show." Shadow smirked. Bless fell to the ground in pain. "You're all mine now… you can't fight back…" he said menacingly and walked over to her. Bless screamed out for help for a few seconds until her vision changed from the terrifying dream world to the real world.

Shadow, her nephew was looking over her and Darkness was a few meters away with her back to the both of them. "H-how are you standing… I thought your legs were broken…" Bless groaned.

"Darkness used a chaos heal on me… she passed out after using it but, she's awake now… she says she's run out of energy… so it looks like you'll have to heal naturally until she gets it back." Shadow said. Bless narrowed her eyes, he was falling for his own daughters tricks.

"You have no idea, do you… while you were unconscious and I was screaming in pain she stayed by you… not even caring about my pain, I think she was even enjoying it… she is the devil I tell you." Bless said to Shadow.

"Well… I can't make her use her powers… she's pretty strong… not very obedient…" Shadow said sadly.

"Of course I'm not obedient, I'm not a dog!" Darkness called back to them.

"So, do you feel a little bit better now?" Shadow asked, examining her wound.

"Yes… a bit better than before… but I don't think I'll be able to move for a while… we need to stay here unless… of course, you leave me." Bless said, getting worried that her dream dad was true.

"We won't leave you… we need you… if something happens… I'll have to carry you or something…" Shadow said. "If nothing has happened yet then I don't think anything will happen for a long time… I don't even think GUN even knows we're gone!"

"I hope your right… I think you should get Darkness to train you while I recover… I'll just watch and see if I can pick a few things up." Bless smiled. Shadow nodded and went to see if Darkness would train him. They were quite far away so Bless couldn't hear them but she could see them. She noticed that they were al quite far away from the area the bomb had exploded in now as well, she was relived to see that.

After a while Darkness began to show Shadow some basic fighting moves and defences, before long they moved into the chaos attacks. Bless wasn't expecting them to get this far so early and now she was missing out. She just watched them both very carefully, especially when it came to the chaos spear. She knew chaos blast was down to rage and feelings but chaos spear needed a command.

She watched them very carefully until they ended for the day. Bless couldn't wait to try it out herself when she was better. The two of them walked back over to Bless, Darkness looking down at her as if she was trash and Shadow looking sympathetic. "I think it's time to rest… I have no idea what time it is now… but… I guess it's night time…" Shadow said feeling unsure. "Wow… it's going to be an uncomfortable sleep tonight." he said, trying to find a comfortable position on the concrete.

"Oh, stop whining." Darkness said in a malicious tone. Bless gasped in shock.

"Shadow, how can you let your daughter talk to you like that?" Bless said angrily.

"Well… she's not really doing much harm… I don't get upset by it… if you do, then you have my full permission to tell her off.. Though I don't think it'll bother her." Shadow said. Bless narrowed her eyes at Darkness, but she didn't seem bothered by it at all so she gave up and went to sleep.

Big mistake.

When she fell asleep her dreams carried on right where they had left off this time! Which means it continued with an immediate hit from her dad. She gave out a scream of pain. "Ugh… what the hell…" she groaned.

"I've decided that starting off where we left each time you fall asleep would be the best for me… waking up in shock before you're hit each time isn't going to help anymore." Shadow hissed. Bless' wound wasn't hurting as much this time, and she realised this would be her chance to test out the Chaos spear she'd had seen the others using.

"That's it! I'm going to get rid of you this time!" Bless said with determination, getting up off the ground. She lifted up her hand, making a striking movement with it next. She was expecting a spear to appear and hit Shadow, but nothing happened. "What!" she said in shock. Shadow began to chuckle malevolently.

"You fool… you don't just make the movement and it happens… you have to do more than that… you need to be taught or get many years of practise, but you don't have years…" Shadow said, smirking maliciously. "You only have- UGH!" his eyes widened, he was being so cocky, he didn't realise that Bless had kicked him in his most sensitive area. He clutched between his legs and fell to his knees. Bless took the chance while he was down and kicked him in the stomach. He was now on the floor, curled up in a foetal position clutching his stomach in agony. Bless walked away from him in triumph, looking back at him cowering in pain.

"Y-you… stupid… rodent… I'll get you… I will not be beaten by a girl…" he said, opening his eyes a little bit, but this time they were green and not red. Bless jumped back but she was woken up.

"Aunt Bless, wake up!" she heard her nephews voice as she was being shaken awake. She sat upright immediately, wondering what was going on. "We woke up hours ago… you're a heavy sleeper." Shadow said. Bless tried to get up but fell back in pain again. "I think you still need to heal… perhaps after that sleep you're ready to help Bless now." he said, turning to Darkness.

"Nope, and you can't make me. She can learn the hard way." Darkness said stubbornly.

"What do you mean, _learn the hard way_?" Shadow asked, narrowing his eyes.

"It's because of her that we're in this mess, she's the one who suggested we look through that crap, if she hadn't said that we would have moved on and we would be fine." Darkness scoffed.

"I don't think so… yeah, she said that but she also suggested we travel, if she hadn't then my decision would be to rebuild our home!" Shadow said. "So I would have gotten us hurt too!" Shadow said.

"I don't think so. We should have left her in the cell, she's nothing but trouble… she can't fight, she has no strength-"

"Didn't those humans tell you how to respect your elders?" Shadow said, butting in. "I said before that if your doing no harm there's no need to punish you be I can see that you're upsetting your aunt Bless!" Shadow said angrily.

"_Great _aunt Bless." Darkness corrected him cheekily. "You were right about respecting elders… but only the _elders _part. She's an old hag and needs to be ridden of!" she said, and stuck her tongue out at the both of them. Suddenly a fist caught the side of her face, making her bite her tongue and fall over. Shadow was now stood over her, a sinister look on his face, it was covered in shadows and looked dark.

"Stop it, now." he said darkly, now sounding a bit like his grandfather. "I'm not going to be soft on you anymore… you blew your chances… now get up, heal Bless and train us or else." he said, leaning over the spot she was sat in, holding his fists up to her. Darkness recovered from the hit and got up, trembling slightly.

She walked over to Bless, put her hands over her broken body. "Chaos Heal!" she said, there was a bright blue light that shone over Bless, she was healed completely, her wounds gone. Darkness fell back onto the floor in weakness, Shadow looked over her dismally while she passed out.

"This won't happen again Bless… I can assure you… if she act up again she'll see my true power." Shadow said. Bless cringed and stepped back, getting further from Shadow. "What's wrong?"

"You're acting a lot like…. My dad… I don't like it." Bless said nervously.

"A-am I?" Shadow said, going back to his usual innocent tone. "Well… I just can't take this crap any more Bless… I think it's changing me. I need to calm down… you don't seem to like how the way your dad acted." he said, looking worried.

"Act that way if you need to… you can't go against your nature… but please, don't turn out bad like he did."

"Turn out bad? But dad said he was a hero? Aunt Bless… is something wrong?" Shadow asked, he sat Darkness upright and began to wait for her to wake up. "I remember Dad telling my stories of Shadow The Hedgehog being a hero… but Mum telling me he was a monster and everyone hated him… which is why we're treated how we are." he said, wanting to know more.

"In truth, he was a hero… but, there was a lot more to it. As much as he tried, he was still dangerous to the humans because of all the bad things he'd done, and the power he possessed. Because we have his genes were treated the same, I think it's his fault for our suffering." Bless said seriously.

"But dad said… it's all GUN's fault… and we should blame them." Shadow said sounding confused.

"You're hearing two different opinions… you need to think about both of them and decide what your opinion is… if you want to go with what your dad said then I understand… but, I don't think you should listen to what your mother said… she never knew him at all, she was just going by the twisted stories she'd heard… I know the truth." Bless said with determination. Although, the truth she knew was different to the real truth, it had been corrupted by the thousands of dreams she had had since she had seen her dad for real. However, the father in her dreams had said to her that he was real and what was that flash of green she saw in his eyes?

**Any Guesses?**

**Lucy Labrador**


	17. Chapter 17

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 17**

**There's an illustration for the previous chapter, find the link to it on my profile.**

After hours of delay, Darkness woke up again however she still refused to teach Bless anything. "I'm still too tired to do anything. Leave me alone." Darkness said stubbornly. Shadow walked up to her threateningly. "Try anything you line on me dad… I'll fight back this time and you know what I'm capable of." Darkness said confidently. Shadow created a chaos spear, anger on his face.

"Shadow, calm down, you're not going to do that to your own daughter are you?" Bless said worriedly. Shadow nodded his head confidently. Darkness then made a chaos spear of her own, it was three times the size of Shadow's. he gulped and stepped back. Bless became angrier and more worried. "Darkness! You're not going to do that to your own father are you?" she said, sounding more worked up. Darkness nodded sinisterly, keeping her evil look on Shadow as he backed up.

Seeing his chance, Shadow launched his chaos spear at Darkness, but she countered it with her larger one, it bounced off to the side and hit Bless instead. Bless cried out and fell to the floor, it hadn't pierced or stabbed her like it did to humans, it just hurt to be hit by a wave of energy. Shadow looked at his daughter furiously, "How dare you!"

"It was an accident… _this time_…" Darkness mocked. "You're the one who shot first. Now… are we going to fight now or what?"

"We're not fighting Darkness… I'm punishing you." Shadow said and tackled her to the floor.

"Is this how you're supposed to punish your kids?" Darkness said, mocking in her tone of voice while she tried to break free of his grasp.

"Well… it's not like I can ground you, is it?" Shadow hissed, "Shouting doesn't work, so this is the only thing that will!" he said, baring his fangs. Bless looked away, unable to watch, it reminded her so closely of her relationship of her dad in her dreams and what he did to her. Darkness was crying out for mercy, but Shadow wasn't giving her any as he hit her in the face. "I'm not stopping yet! You need to learn, only then will you know how to treat people right!" Shadow said savagely as he continued to beat his daughter.

Bless wanted to intervene but she didn't want to question her nephew's parenting methods, she had no children of her own, so how would she know better and Darkness was hard to get through to. Darkness was soon bleeding and crying for mercy, so Shadow stopped, turned away from her. That's when Bless saw how ashamed Shadow looked, he had tears in his eyes that he was trying hard to keep back. He walked away from Darkness looking sorry and upset. He then ran to Bless and hugged her tight. "I feel so evil…" he sobbed into her torso. "But know it's the only way…" he added, bawling.

Bless looked over Shadow's shoulder over to Darkness who was unconscious, bleeding from the face and had a black eye. Bless cringed at the sight and decided to comfort her nephew. "It's ok… she'll be fine within a couple of days, and it's the only way she'll learn her lesson… you were very strong…" Bless assured him.

"I feel like a horrible parent… for letting her get this bad." Shadow shook, letting the tears fall.

"Don't be daft… you're not the one who brought her up… GUN did, of course she's going to act how she does. She wasn't a child who needed bringing up in the right way to them, she was just a weapon." Bless said, hoping it would make Shadow feel better about himself. "I guess this is the start to getting her back on track and you're doing good."

"We won't know that until she wakes up and we see her new behaviour." Shadow said, looking nervous. "What if she wakes up angry and tries to destroy me… or wakes up depressed and tries to kill herself or… doesn't wake up at all!" he panicked.

"She _will _wake up, she _won't _be depressed and if she does attack you again, I know you're strong enough to beat her." she said, trying to increase Shadow's confidence. After a long time, Shadow fell asleep in her arms. Bless lay her nephew down gently and went to check on Darkness. She stood over her still body in grief, Darkness had been trouble to Bless from the start and she was only getting worse, to her father, Shadow, as well as her aunt, Bless. Suddenly she felt a hand grip her ankle and yank it. Bless fell to the floor, hitting her head on a rock, the sharp pain travelling throughout her skull.

She looked up at the blurry images she could see. She saw Darkness getting up looking very infuriated and walking over to her father in her rage. Bless couldn't do anything about it though, since she was going unconscious.

"You're a such a little pest!" she heard the voice of her father hiss. She saw him getting up from the attack she had imposed on him the last time she was with him. "I'm not holding back on you anymore and I mean it! I hope you take a long time to wake up again because this is going to be fun…" he sneered, baring his sharp teeth in a sinister confidence. "Now… where to start." he said in delight.

Bless felt terrified on the inside but showed no weakness to him. Shadow charged at Bless, it was too fast for her to dodge, the only thing she could try was- "Chaos Spear!" it worked this time and went through Shadow's shoulder. He cried out in pain, holding his now dislocated and sliced shoulder, that area turning from red and black to a dark purple colour, drips of thick purple ooze falling to the ground.

It had worked, Bless hoped she would be able to do the same in the real world. But what was happening to Shadow. His eyes that were narrowed in pain and hatred flashed green for a split second again. Bless backed away in fear, this was new and very different, she didn't know what to do about it. She decided the best thing to do would be to try the chaos spear again. She tried it again, but missed as Shadow leapt out of the way. "I'm not going to fall for the same trick twice you idiot…" he sneered. "Now, think of something new and perhaps you'll catch me."

Bless was stuck, she wasn't angry enough to try and chaos blast and she didn't know anything else! She would just have to fight without chaos powers. She tried punching him but she didn't have strong enough fists. "Ouch, that really hurt… your fists are like cushions!" Shadow mocked. Bless smirked as she thought of something. She went to punch him again so he stood to take the punch that he thought that would not hurt him, but Bless quickly changed her attack to a chaos spear!

It hit Shadow in the face, where it left a giant scratch. His whole face started to change now, the face of her father disappeared to reveal green eyes which were red where it should have been white. This creature had no nose, and no mouth. The quills were the same as Shadow's only it was a dark blue-ish purple and crystalline. Bless nearly fainted from the sight. "WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU DAD!" She screamed out, running away from him backwards to keep looking at him.

"DAD! I'm not you're dad! I am not that pathetic rodent, Shadow The Hedgehog!" he called out in his new, deeper voice. "I am Mephiles the Dark!" he announced in anger. "I've been tricking your mind all along and I cannot believe you've destroyed disguise! I'm going to destroy you in your dreams so that you never wake up!"

"W-why… have you done this? All these years of torment… and it was _you_… whoever you are…" Bless said in fear.

"Have I now just told you who I am! Mephiles! An old enemy of your father… since he was gone I wanted to torment the person with the closest personality to him, and that was you! I found your weakness and vulnerability, not having a dad any more, missing him so much, I took it and used it to torment you in your dreams." he explained with a sinister edge to his voice.

"I… can't believe it…" Bless said, starting to cry. "Just go away…" she shook.

"Ha! You imbecile! Just because you have uncovered my true identity, it doesn't mean I'll go away… I'll just make it even life even harder for you!" he yelled out, there was a flash and his whole body was uncovered, he no longer used the Shadow disguise, it was all him now.

"Mephi… uh… what was it now?" Bless shook.

"Mephiles…" he grumbles.

"Okay, Mephiles… Please… just leave me alone… I haven't done anything to you… I don't even know you.. Just please… go and torment my father instead…" Bless begged.

"I do that during my day shift… in other words, when you're awake." he teased.

"So… you know where he is?" she asked urgently, this could be the answer to all of her problems. Mephiles chuckled sinisterly.

"Of course I do…" he chuckled. "But I'm not telling you…" he said in a dark serious voice.

"Tell me!" Bless screamed out, creating a chaos spear ready, fur bristled, ready to explode if he angered her any further.

"You're not going to kill me… are you?" Mephiles said in an obviously fake afraid voice. "Because if you do I can never tell you where he is and… you'll never find him."

"I'm willing to pass the opportunity to find out where he is… now… tell me now or die!" Bless threatened. There was a moment of tense silence, the two of them looking each other in the eyes until Mephiles said one word that would cause his defeat.

"_Never._"

Bless let all of her rage go, the chaos blast impacting Mephiles and turning him to his liquid form where he retreated, leaving Bless' mind free.

She woke up with a fresh mind with no more fear, until she realised the situation. Darkness and Shadow! She looked around to see them in a hurry, hoping that they were ok. Shadow was stood over Darkness who was cowering in defeat, it looked like they had fought and Darkness had given up. Shadow left her in her fear and walked over to Bless. "I don't think she'll be giving us any more trouble… hopefully it's over now… as long as I'm around to keep her behaviour in good condition." Shadow said triumphantly, peering back at the ashamed looking Darkness.

"Well done… let's hope you'll be staying with us then…" Bless said, getting up. "Now, let's go, if we stay here much longer we might be found." Bless said, they started to travel to see if they could find a safe place to stay or possible some relatives that had escaped the GUN raid.

With Bless' dream troubles over along with her troubles with Darkness, it seemed she had won her battles however the war was still continuing and she has to fight to win it. She knew that it was her dad hurting her but it was certain, she still hated him and she would use her new moves on him when she got the chance.

**Lucy Labrador**


	18. Chapter 18

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 18**

Later that day after the Mephiles incident, Bless remembered that she was able to use Chaos Control and Chaos Blast in her dream. She couldn't wait to try it out in the real world. So, when she was able to get up and move properly, she tried. First the Chaos Spear. Nothing. "What!" she exclaimed. She tried again and again, harder and harder concentrating more and more, but there was nothing. She let out a cry of frustration, she could only use it in her dreams… it made so much sense, in her mind she could do anything but in reality, it was so much harder.

Fast forward about 50 years. Bless, Shadow and Darkness still travelled, their kind had multiplied crazily and GUN were getting tougher. They were on the run and had been lucky to stay in freedom. Bless had learnt how to cope for herself completely and the other two seemed fine on their own so, they came to a decision. Shadow turned to Bless one night they were trying to settle down, feeling nervous, this wasn't going to be easy. "Look… Aunt Bless… I love you very much… you've been great to me all of these years but…" he started. Bless' eyes widened, she was terrified of what he was going to say, what was he going to say? "It's getting harder and harder to hide from GUN and you know… three's a crowd so…" he said, loosing his confidence after that.

"You're… kicking me out of the group?" Bless said, feeling as if the life had been drained from her. "You can't do this!" she screamed.

"We can." Darkness said cruelly. "You're just dead weight to us now… you can live by yourself."

"No she's not!" Shadow said, punching his daughter in the stomach, anyone who didn't know the group would think Shadow was a bad parent, but it was the only way they could get Darkness to behave. Darkness stayed quiet after this. "I'm really sorry Bless but… maybe you'll find someone else who is alone… our kind only to travels in twos… not threes… it's too risky… I'm sorry. You can stay with us for one last sleep but after that…" he said and stopped talking.

"But I'm superior to you both!" Bless said angrily. "We're staying together!" she commanded.

"It doesn't matter that you're superior, it's a majority vote and it's final!" Shadow said getting frustrated.

"But we're a team!" Bless cried. "I don't even know how to use chaos powers yet!"

"Yet? What do you mean yet? If you can't do them now, then you can't do them at all! You're not able to now stop this!" Shadow yelled. Bless couldn't face them at all. Mephiles was right, they would ditch her. Her eyes filled with tears and she ran, not caring to say goodbye, they didn't deserve a goodbye. She knew Shade would never approve of this, but he wasn't there to have his opinion. So, she left them, she turned back for a second, noticed Shadow's upset look and behind Shadow's back Darkness had an evil look that teased Bless and as soon as Shadow turned to Darkness, her expression changed. Bless couldn't take it, she turned away, running harder to increase her speed and never looked back, she hoped to never see them again.

They had been such an effective team and got to know each other so well. They had been though so much together and all of a sudden it was over, Bless was alone, and she couldn't take it. She felt the same way she had when she thought Shade had rejected her when she was younger.

She felt the despair take over her and fell to her knees, giving up completely. She collapsed onto the ground completely, feeling her muscles give up and her life draining away. She felt the full blown depression take over her, she felt a strong pain in her chest as she began to fall into unconsciousness. Last time this had happened, Shade was there to make her feel better and get her out of this comatose like state but this time there was no one around. It was like her mind and body had found out that there was no reason to live on, and had given up.

Her muscles relaxed, her eyes filled with tears and they fell freely, she had let herself go, her conscious going, her body going to sleep, for real, no Mephiles to annoy her or torment her, and no one to save her, she smiled as she closed her eyes as if it would be the last time she did so, as if her body had found peace.

When she opened her eyes, she saw the kind face of her mother. "Mum?" Bless called, was it really her? Was she dead like her mum?

"Bless… don't give up… I'm watching you, I always have been and always will be…" she said in a soft voice. "Shade is too." she said, turning to her side to see Shade coming into view. They were in complete emptiness, only not dark like the one bless experienced before. "I understand now, why you had those dreams and what they were and I'm so proud of you for putting a stop to it." Maria said, hugging her. Shade came forward nodding and smiling. The two of them came forward to hug her.

"WAIT! What if this is all a dream? And I get all happy for nothing…"

"It's real, just like Mephiles was." Maria assured. "Please… now…" she said, Bless accepted the both of them and she began to cry with both happiness and sadness. She was happy to see the two of them but she was also upset that when she would wake up they would be gone. "Now that you're happy… maybe you'll see a reason to live on… please…"

"Of course… um, Shade… are you watching over Shadow and Darkness?" Bless asked nervously. Shade nodded, looking solemn. "You saw what they did to me?"

"Yes… and I'm disappointed in them…" Shade sighed.

"So… what are they doing now?" Bless asked.

"I can't tell you that…" Shade said sadly. "I've been watching you a little to… you're doing well out there… I hope you don't get seen by GUN while you're unconscious."

"Well, what if I do? So what? There's no one in the living world that cares about me any more." Bless complained. "I'll definitely find family then."

"No Bless… don't think that way! Please, fight like you always have!" Maria begged her. "Like Shadow did!"

"Where is he now?" Bless asked desperately. The two of them were silent. "Let me guess… you're not allowed to say…" Bless said and started to sulk.

"You should try and wake up… in case you get caught." Maria urged. Bless shook her head.

"No! What if I never get to see you again!" she panicked.

"You will! Every time you sleep, now wake up!" Maria said, her voice fading away at the end. Bless woke up to find that she had not been captured… but she was about to be!

She saw a pair of hands reaching for her body, she leapt out of the way and ran. After a few seconds of running, a few vehicles started to chase her. She was glad she had trained herself to run faster over the years, she couldn't run at sonic speed but she had a fighting chance. She was able to get ahead, hide under some ruins and watch the vehicles continue to rocket ahead.

Her heart was beating fast, she had nearly been caught. She was glad the feeling of depression and despair had gone, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to run, she would have been a weak mess, who was crippled by the pain in her heart.

But now she had a reason to live and would try to find some more family and a place to live. She didn't mind travelling all of the time if she had someone to talk to and socialise with but when she was alone, it made her want somewhere to stay even more. So her new targets were, to find a place to live or find some family, a black arms hedgehog.

**I think the last few chapters will be shorter than normal or I'll run out of things to write about before I reach 20 chapters!**

**Lucy Labrador**


	19. Chapter 19

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 19**

**Just two more chapters to go. But I'm back in school, so it'll be harder to update!**

The year was 3420 and Bless _had _found some family, and a place to stay, it was in a little community that consisted of normal Mobians and Black Arms hedgehogs. The family she had found lived in this community. The one person she had found was Dusk who was in fact Shadow II's brother. He'd escaped from the concentration camps, and managed to find somewhere to live. Bless had found this place with Dusk. He was all alone before he had found Bless… his family all in captivity or on the run elsewhere. He had a personality very similar to Maria's and a voice similar to Shadow's. (The Original, this is confusing.) His eyes were like Shadow's but his hair short and scruffy.

Dusk didn't actually have a house to live in. The normal Mobians had little houses to live in but the Black Arms hedgehogs never attempted to settle down in a permanent home, they all knew that GUN could show up at any time and find them out.

So, the Black Arms Hedgehogs just lingered, sleeping between houses and working and begging to get food off the other Mobians. Bless had gotten back into eating and drinking again. It was a little inconvenient but her life was boring without eating such nice food. So much was on offer, she couldn't resist, neither could Dusk.

There was one young- adult female hedgehog that would always be there for them and invite the two of them inside. Her name was Ashleigh-Rose, she was a pink hedgehog that had a resemblance to Amy. Dusk had taken a liking to her.

The three of them were sitting in the living room of her small house to have a drink together. Ashleigh had tea, Bless had apple juice and Dusk had coffee.

Hearing the familiar name of 'Rose' Bless became curious Ashleigh looked a little like Amy, and had the same middle name as her. She had to ask her weather she was related to her. Nervously, not hoping she wouldn't feel offended or afraid of such a question Bless asked her, "So… Ashleigh… are you a descendant of Amy-Rose?" she asked nervously.

"Oh.. Umm… yes…" She smiled. "My family talked about her a lot… I believe I'm her very great granddaughter."

"Wow… that would mean you're also a descendant of Sonic The Hedgehog-" Bless said but stopped as she saw Ashleigh's eyes widen. "Y-you didn't… know?"

"How is that possible?" Ashleigh said, eyes wide in a weak voice.

"Well… Sonic and Amy had children together so…" Bless started but Ashleigh squealed which meant she was interrupted again.

"NO WAY! I'm related to SONIC! Legends about him are everywhere… that he saved the world so many times!"

"They're not legends…" Bless smirked. "Those stories are real… most of it happened just before I was born… and my dad…" she said, choking up a little when she mentioned her dad. "… helped him…" she said and went quiet.

"Wow… you know him too… and it's all real… I never realised any of this… I wish the rest of my family were here to know this…" she said. Dusk was smirking, watching her in excitement, Ashleigh saw this and smiled back.

Bless, realising this smirked to herself. She could see there was something going on between them. Despite the fact that Dusk already had a family but his past wife was long gone, she wasn't immortal.

She finished her apple juice and Ashleigh poured her another glass politely. "Oh… thanks…" Bless smiled nervously. She began to drink it in politeness even though she felt her last few glasses wanting to exit.

Dusk and Ashleigh were chatting to themselves while Bless became desperate to relive herself, but she didn't show her need and she was too shy to ask to use the toilet. "Dusk… I'm going outside for some fresh air…" Bless said, finishing off her drink and carefully getting up. Dusk just nodded and carried on talking with Ashleigh.

Bless left feeling herself get even more urgent. She would try and find a public toilet of some sort, and hide her situation from the other people. After about fifteen minutes of walking and looking, which had led her outside of the community, she found a block of toilets, she tried to open the door but they were locked, tight. "Please no…" she cried out. Then she saw the sign, you had to pay to get in, but putting the money in a slot by the door handle, it would be unlocked, but Bless didn't have any change, only notes. She sighed, turned around and leant against' the door in frustration.

A human male was walking past and noticed her discomfort while she held the useless note in her hands. They walked a little closer to her. "Hey… do you need change?" they asked her. Bless nodded while blushing, she was also unsure of weather she should trust this human.

"I have some if you want to swap…" he said.

"Oh… yes please… thank you…" she said, walking over to him. All of a sudden he grabbed her hands and put them in a pair of handcuffs. Bless cried out, it was an undercover GUN soldier! Bless now regret walking too far from the community. "What kind of a sick person are you? Preying on girls who have to go!" Bless yelled as she was dragged away to a vehicle. If she wasn't so desperate she would have kicked him between the legs and beat him up easily, however that would mean moving a lot and she would have an accident.

She then thought back to the time she had used a certain excuse at The Commander so that he would let her go to the toilet. "Y-you don't understand…" Bless said, acting worried.

"What? You're desperate? I don't care… you can go when you get to the concentration camp!" he snarled, strapping her into the hover car. **(Hover Cars! YAY!)**

"N-no… it's my… time of month…" Bless said timidly. The man's eyes widened and he chucked her out of the car. He then pushed her over to the toilets, got the door opened for her and pushed her inside. "There! But I'm only giving you ONE minute."

"But… that's not long enough…" Bless cried out, crossing her legs on the spot. The man growled so she ran into a cubicle without further question, she would kick his ass when she felt better.

The soldier waited outside, hearing the toilet flush and the taps go her got ready to grab her. He decided to turn around to see her come out but it was too late, he felt a foot hit his groin and a firm fist impact his head and all went dark for him.

Bless broke the handcuffs on one of the pipes in the toilet block and decided to head back to Ashleigh's house. When she returned Dusk and Ashleigh were no longer in the living room. She had a look around the house, they weren't in the kitchen either. Then she heard some sounds from the bedroom, sounds of pleasure and-

She darted out of the house in a few seconds, not wanting to hear anymore of it and not wanting to know how it even happened. She knew the two of them had something going on between them but she didn't expect it to escalate to quickly.

So… Bless feared she would be all alone again. Like when she and Shade were so close until he found Heather. But at least she had a place to stay. She went between Ashleigh's and her next door neighbours' houses and fell asleep.

Bless wasn't left out of things as much as Shade had left her out, even when it turned out that Ashleigh was pregnant. Of course, there were no hospitals around and even if there was one, they wouldn't be able to go because Dusk was a Black Arms hedgehog. So, Ashleigh gave birth at home. Bless sat outside of the room while Shade helped Ashleigh give birth. Two hours into the pain and misery there was a loud knock at the door. Bless went to open it since the other two were pretty much two busy.

It was one of the neighbours, they looked afraid. "GUN are coming!" they screamed. "You and any other Black Arms hedgehogs have to hide!" they yelled and ran off to warn every other house. Bless's eyes widened in fear, they couldn't hide, Ashleigh was giving birth! Bless went running into the bedroom where Ashleigh was crying out in pain.

"Bless!" Dusk exclaimed, signalling for her to go.

"No! we have to hide! GUN are coming!" Bless cried out.

"But… Ashleigh is giving birth! How can I! You can run if you want… but I'm staying…" Dusk said in determination. "Just go… I'll be okay…" he said solemnly. Bless nodded, as if she were saying goodbye and left. She was most definitely alone now, unless Dusk were to find a way around this.

GUN would make unexpected visits every so often where they would search inside everyone's houses for Black Arms presence. It was just very bad luck that they would be breaking in while Ashleigh was having a baby. Since they only searched inside the houses, Bless decided to hide on the roof of the house where she wouldn't be seen since it was flat and if she laid down low she wouldn't be visible. So, she climbed up the wall by jumping up the small gap between the houses, she kept her fingers crossed as she lay down and heard people panic as doors were knocked on, knocked open or knocked down.

With Dusk, inside, he heard a knock at the door but didn't answer it, so there was a large crash as the soldiers were smashing in by breaking the door open. That's when they began searching the house to find Dusk in the bedroom with Ashleigh. That's when they pointed their guns at him and grabbed him. They noticed there was a woman about to give birth in the bed. "Are you the father of this child that's about to be born?" they asked threateningly. Ashleigh's eyes widened even more, they were already wide form the pain.

"N-no… I'm just a friend who's helping her… the father left already…" Dusk lied sadly. Dusk was hoping they would leave before the baby was born and they would see it's red and black fur. The GUN soldiers believed him and dragged him out of the house.

"Dusk! No please! Don't go! Please bring him back!" she cried out but the soldiers didn't listen nor did they pay attention to her at all, they just searched the remainder of the house and left. Once the coast was clear Bless jumped down and ran back into the house. When she found Ashleigh she looked weak, a baby at the bottom of the bed. Bless grabbed the equipment they had gathered and cut the umbilical cord, cleaned up the baby and passed it to Ashleigh. "You… Black Arms hedgehogs'… really are deadly… I've heard tales of so many mortal women, mothers of their babies dying in childbirth or soon after…" she said, tears streaming from her face.

"What are you talking about… you're not going to die…" Bless said, looking at the baby. She was shocked to see that it wasn't red and black. It was white, nearly grey male hedgehog.

"No… I think I am… this doesn't feel right… b-before it happens… remember this… I want our son to be called… Silver…" she said and her eyes closed for the final time.

**Look on my profile for links to pictures of Dusk and Ashleigh. Just one more chapter to go now!**

**Lucy Labrador**


	20. Chapter 20

**What A Long Hard Life: Bless' Story**

**Chapter 20**

**Finally. The story comes to an end. Some final moments here. **

Bless took the baby from it's dead mother's arms. It was called Silver. She began to think, she was sure her dad had mentioned someone called Silver before… from the future…. She gasped, looking at him. She'd never met this Silver person before but she had a feeling it was him. She knew that she couldn't keep him and that if he knew of his ancestors, the past would be changed… possibly. So… she wrapped him up in a blanket and put him near the community centre where many people visited. Hopefully, someone would find the baby and adopt it.

She couldn't stay because the baby could get traced back to her. So she ran, she couldn't stay there. Not for a long time. Not until she knew Silver had grown up and gone back in time to meet Shadow, until it was safe.

She watched from a distance as the baby Silver was picked up by a young woman who looked around to see if the baby belonged to anyone. Once she knew it was safe she took it away. Bless smiled, but she would have to check up on him again.

Bless decided to travel and return in about 15 years. It should be safe then. So, she grabbed a bag from the house she had shared with Dusk and Ashleigh, packed a small amount of supplies and left. She felt sorry for the person who would find Ashleigh's dead body.

She ran with the bag on her back, it was quite heavy but since she didn't pack a lot she was okay. Perhaps she could find a new place that could be her home for a decade and a half. After a few weeks of walking she found one, it was a community that was similar to the once she had lived in, but she didn't know weather she would be accepted.

She entered the street, where a lot of Mobians were crowding around something. Not caring about the consequences, she ran to the crowd to see what was going on. "My baby's on fire!" screamed a woman. Bless pushed past everyone in the crowd to see if she could help. There was an anthropomorphic infant in the middle of the crowd, it's mother screaming and the crowd gasping. Many people tried to help by chucking cold water over the baby. The fire would just go out for a second and then ignite again.

"Maybe it has Pyrokinesis…" Bless said. The baby was distressed so it wasn't stopping however it didn't seem to be getting hurt. "Just leave it alone!" she yelled. Then a few angry Mobians turned to her angrily.

"Do you want her to die?" they yelled. Bless was grabbed by one of the males. She managed to break free, running over to the baby, trying to calm it down.

"What are you doing! Get away from my baby!" said an anthropomorphic cat. Bless didn't know what to do. She knew exactly how to stop this disaster but no one was letting her do it. With people charging at her, she began to get stressed, closing her eyes tight, she couldn't take it any more then all sound stopped. It was silent. She opened her eyes and looked around her, people still charging at her but… very slowly.

She had slowed down time using chaos control. The fire was burning and spitting and flickering from the baby very slowly. She had to do this. Taking a deep breath she got a blanket out of her bag, at least she could protect herself, then she used the blanket to pick the baby up and soothe it, the blanket felt hot but it was crumbled and burnt slowly. Soon the baby stopped crying, just in time because time went back to normal.

Everyone looked shocked. As if Bless had moved very fast. They all stepped back. Bless gave the baby to it's mother, it was no longer making fire so it was safe. Bless held her hands together tightly, they had been burnt. "Oh Blaze…you're okay…" the woman shouted, hugging her baby.

Bless was hoping she would get praise, or a thank you, anything! Help for her burnt hands? Nothing. Everyone just went back inside to their homes, including the woman with her baby. "Those ungrateful little…" she started to grumble. Bless left, she would go and find somewhere with cold water where she could help her hands feel better.

But in a burning world it was hard to do this. Unless she found a tap or some plumbing. Her hands were throbbing in pain, then she remembered, she had some water packed in her bag. She always filled them up when she could so over the last few weeks she hadn't run out. So, she poured some of the water over her hands. It felt good, but she couldn't do it forever or she'd run out. She'd have to put up with the pain until it healed.

Bless spent those 15 years going from place to place. Finding places to sleep and eat and survive. She'd been in a few close shaves but she had managed to stay out of the hands of GUN.

She was sitting around on her own. Waiting for events to happen, her life was boring now, she almost liked it when she got into those close shaves. The world was still in darkness, no sun to be seen, but Bless hardly knew better. She agley remembered what the world was like before this disaster, although she as quite young when it happened.

But her memories would not have to be the only thing to give her those images for much longer. All of a sudden, as she was looking up at the sky the dark clouds ruptures for a second and then fades out of existence, the light blue sky started to shine through and the sun's beams felt so wonderful.

This is when she knew, it was time to find Silver. She made her journey back to the old Community where she had left Silver a long time ago, it taking her several days to get there. But then she saw him, standing alone, looking upset. Bless walked up to him, she knew it was Silver, it looked just like the Silver she saw when he was a baby. "Hello Silver…" She said. He looked up at her in confusion.

"Do I know you? Are you a descendant of… Shadow perhaps?" he asked, standing up.

"Yes… I'm his daughter… why, do you know _him_?" she asked, although she knew that Silver had met him already.

"Yes… we were allies once… in the past… if you're his daughter… you must be really old." he said. Bless' face expression turned from happy to furious. Silver stepped back in fear. Bless decided to calm down. "Sorry…" Silver said, nervously.

"It's… okay…" She said, calming down. "So… have you seen him around at all? I haven't seen him since the beginning of the disaster…" she said.

"What? I haven't seen him either… I wonder why he left…"

"Me too… I hate him so much for leaving." Bless said in anger. "When I find him…" she growled.

"Well… I might be able to find him… my only friend is…" he went quiet for a second. "Umm… yeah…. I'm sure I can find him if I look." Silver said. "While everyone's concentrated on the defeat of Iblis… I'll look at GUN's files or something, see what they know."

"Good idea… I doubt you'd be able to find him though… about… 200 years I've been looking out for him… and nothing."

"I'm sure I can… if I take my chance… I'll see you in a while, once I've found him. Don't know how long but, ya know… see ya." Silver said and ran off to see what he could find out.

This left Bless all alone again. She would have to wait until Silver came back saying he'd failed… she felt as if Silver was wasting his own time. Bless went to look at her old house where she used to live with Dusk and Ashleigh. It looked like someone else was living there now.

She would just have to hang about, but it had been a long time since she's last been here and everyone was different now. They'd all either forgotten about Bless or there was all new people there who didn't like Black Arms hedgehogs. She would wait until Silver returned and asked him if he lived anywhere. Like always, she continued to wait.

A few days passed and she began to wonder where Silver was and what was taking him so long. She saw in the distance, Silver returning with a red and black hedgehog. The two of them were quite far away so Bless couldn't work out whether she knew this black arms hedgehog or not. As they got closer, she could make out their features more.

Despite the fact that many looked like this hedgehog, she knew it was him. Her blood started to boil as they came closer. It was Shadow alright, and she was ready for him. Him and Silver were talking, Shadow looking to the floor sulkily. Bless thought that was just typical of him to sulk. He looked up from the floor to see her. "Bless!" he said, smiling. His voice similar to some of his descendants but still so unique. It was definitely him, and he was walking up to her. Seeing this she knew exactly what she would do….

**And that continues in 'What A Long Hard Life' Chapter 14. Thank you for reading. Despite this story being a lot longer with it's words, not chapters, there's been less reviews for the other story. More effort for less reviews. Nonetheless, it reached 50 reviews so I'm extremely happy about that! Thank you all so much for your support. Now I need to Finnish 'It Isn't The End' and 'Sonic Taskers Shorts.' Please, if you haven't already, review. **

**Lucy Labrador**


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